PROJECTS

Spotlight on Local, Royal Agricultural Winter Fair, 2019

Special Projects Coordinator

The Royal Agricultural Winter Fair's Spotlight on Local won the 2020 Award of Distinction in the Best New Initiative Category AND the Events & Festivals category, from the Sponsorship Marketing Council of Canada.

Spotlight on Local was a brand new feature of the 2019 Royal Agricultural Winter Fair, occupying 20,000 sq ft of space in the prime Heritage Court section of the fair and showcasing food and beverages produced in Ontario. The feature included a 1750 sq ft activation by Metro which featured 10 of their local producers over the course of the 10-day event. This included 9 RTO & DMO booths that introduced consumers to each region's locally produced food and beverages as well as culinary tourism experiences. It also expanded the Champions' Showcase section that featured displays of the Royal's food competition winners by offering a rotating selection of winning products for guests to sample each day.

Leni began project coordination for this 10-day live event months in advance, including:

  • Inviting tourism organizations to participate and guiding them to program their space within the parameters of the feature.

  • Working with Metro’s marketing team and agency to coordinate their activation.

  • Working with partners such as the Greenbelt Foundation, Metro, and OMAFRA.

  • Working internally with the Royal’s Agriculture & Food department to add three new categories of food competitions (ice cream, RTE meat snacks, and hot sauce, in addition to the traditional honey, maple, jams, jellies and pickles, butter tarts, cheese, and butter).

The Spotlight on Local space also included the OLG entertainment stage which was programmed with educational content, music, comedy, and dancing.

The Spotlight on Local project increased collaboration between the tourism and agriculture sectors and other stakeholders in the local food supply chain. Ultimately, the event gave a platform to Ontario food and beverage producers as well as created a space to market culinary tourism experiences. This event brought together 300,000 consumers over the course of 10 days and allowed us to reach the most important goal of increasing the profile of locally produced food and producers in the eyes of Ontarians.