It’s Small Business Week in Saskatchewan, and a celebration is certainly in order for those businesses who continue to be engaged in navigating the pitfalls of COVID-19. As part of the week long appreciation, Sagehill Community Futures brings to the table an opportunity for small businesses. 

“Innovation Through COVID-19” is designed to be a showcase of business innovations carried out by local entrepreneurs to keep the lights on at a time when many were forced to close to conventional sales or services. Sagehill is offering five businesses in the Sagehill region the sum of $3,000 each as an award for innovative thinking. 

Patrons can nominate local businesses to receive the award by providing information on how the enterprise has demonstrated creativity and innovation in responding to the trials of COVID-19. Nominations for the awards will open on October 25 and close November 7, 2020. 

Once nominations close, the public can vote for the business of its choices by going online to the Sagehill Community Futures website or their Facebook page.

In order to be eligible, businesses must be located in the Sagehill region and have been in operation prior to March 2020, and they can not have an affiliation with Sagehill Community Futures board members or staff. 

“The Board of Sagehill knew that businesses had to be very creative and innovative to keep their businesses open during the beginning of COVID-19,” explains Susan Wehage, Director of Sagehill Community Futures. “So we have been talking about this for a while, and it was what can we do to help small businesses during these unprecedented times.”

The plan they came up with was to involve not only businesses but the patrons and communities as well. In a move that was, to an extent, inspired by the Hockeyville promotion, the board and staff devised a voting based competition that rewards such entrepreneurial innovation. 

Nomination forms will be available on the Sagehill website. Individuals can download the nomination and provide a few simple details as to how a business has demonstrated creative thinking to support its patrons and make goods and services available to the public. 

Wehage is excited to be part of the project that targets proprietors who think outside of the box. She mentions a hairdresser in the region who went so far as to video counsel her clients on do it yourself hair colouring and provided the premixed colours in ready to go packaging for curbside pick up. Others have implemented home delivery systems, new payment options, or digital ordering. Any new initiatives undertaken during the COVID restrictions are fair game in terms of the criteria.

“It’s any idea that they never did before that they are doing now,” says Wehage. “It can be a package of multiple things so long as it stands out as something they did in the community to help get through COVID-19.”

Once the nominations are in, all of the voting will be done online. Voting can be done through the Sagehill Community Futures Facebook page or through their website. The listing of nominees and the description of their innovations will be posted on the website as well. 

“We are excited to get the communities involved in supporting their small businesses and doing it by voting.”

Voters can participate once per day per email address, explains Wehage.

For more details on innovation through COVID-19, including a listing of eligible communities, head to the website: https://cfsask.ca/innovation-through-covid-19. Voting will be open from November 15 to November 28, 2020.