Some Black Diamond merchants say they're facing their most profitable season yet as the small community experienced heavier than average tourist traffic the past four months.
With Canadians staying close to home as a result of travel bans around the world, an influx in visitors from close to home filled Black Diamond's main streets throughout the warmer months.
Isis Velkova, proprietor of Tender Living Farm, said this season was her most profitable in the three years she’s been selling herbal teas and oils, bath salts, tinctures and other apothecary products out of Bertie’s General Store on Government Road.
“It’s totally wild,” she said. “It’s been bumper-to-bumper traffic through town.”
Velkova and other merchants were forced to close their doors temporarily as positive COVID-19 cases began to climb rapidly in Alberta in March, but once retailers and restaurants were permitted to reopen in June, business immediately picked up with many customers hailing from the Calgary area.
“Calgary has been our main support right from day one,” she said. “Now that more Calgarians are staying local we’ve just been discovered even more, which is great. It’s just building that following and support network.”
Marv’s Classic Soda Shop on Centre Avenue also hit a stride since early June.
“It’s been absolutely crazy,” said owner Marv Garriott. “We are just coming off of four record months. Normally in September during the week we might do $300 or $350 in a day. This month I’ve only had one day where I’ve done under $900.”
Garriott attributes his business success to two factors: an increase in tourist traffic and hiring someone to ramp up his social media presence.
The long-time proprietor offered curbside pick-up when restaurants were mandated to close their doors to sit-down customers in early spring, but he stayed afloat with help from the Canada Emergency Wage Subsidy.
Once his doors reopened, customers arrived in droves.
“People are getting out of Calgary and people are traveling from Spruce Grove and Edmonton and Saskatchewan and all over the place,” he said. “People were staying in Alberta and that helped a whole bunch, too.”
As summer winds down, sales typically follow suit, but Garriott said rather than sales dropping 40 per cent from July to August as is typical, they increased by 40 per cent from the previous month this year.
“This is the first year in 20 years that I will actually have a dollar in the bank in December,” he said.
Luc Bayard of Cool Hand Luc's Treasure Shop has yet to crunch his numbers, but he, too, feels business did exceptionally well this summer despite losing three months of sales due to the Province’s mandated closures last spring.
Bayard received some relief when his landlord waived his rent and then lowered the rate when he reopened his doors.
The bustling streets of Black Diamond helped tremendously once businesses were given the green light from the Province to reopen, Bayard said.
“The traffic in Black Diamond is nuts now,” he said. “The whole street is full of cars. They just keep coming.”
Eager to make up for lost business, Bayard remained open seven days a week throughout much of the summer despite being a one-man operation.
“Usually I’m closed on Monday and sometimes Tuesday,” he said. “I didn’t want to close because we had so much tourists.”
Bayard said he saw customers from Calgary, Strathmore, Cochrane, Okotoks, High River and Lethbridge.
“It’s always been like that,” he said. “I even had people from France and different countries. I don’t know how they got here but they did.”
Across the street, Diamond in the Rough co-owner Jo-Anne King also enjoyed a fruitful summer. She took over the business with daughter Mali on July 1.
“July was a very good month, very active with customers and it had continued through August and September,” she said. “It was less than other years but we’ve done quite well so we’re very pleased with the start that we’ve had. The expectation was definitely to break even and we managed to do better than that.”
King said she believes the pandemic brought customers she normally wouldn’t have had to the area because people weren’t travelling to the United States or overseas.
“A lot of Calgary people came through and visited, like day trippers that were just interested in seeing what they could do in their own back yard,” she said. “I believe we benefited from that.”
Although the business had previously stayed open seven days a week before the Kings’ ownership, the new owners chose to close on Mondays and Tuesdays.
“We aren’t looking at this point to bring on staff,” King said. “We probably will consider that for next year.”
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