The Keystone Centre

challenge.” BVM: What are the Centre’s future plans? Schumacher: “A lot of our focus is going to be bringing in more outside organizations for conventions and conferences. It’s a pretty attractive location because we have everything they need. We have an attached hotel, and a lot of hotel rooms, which for any convention is very important. You can fly into Winnipeg, or even into Brandon, depending on where you’re coming from. Certainly, we’ll be revisiting what other uses we can have for our land, where we’re not now taking advantage of the space. As far as venues, we’re really just trying to make the best use of the space we have. It’s just such a big space and it’s so much to maintain. It’s more one of these ‘do the best with what you have’ and grow your business.” BVM: How much bigger can it grow? How many events do you already host, annually? Kowaluk: “Last I checked with sales, it was somewhere around five to six thousand bookings per year. It is high. We’re talking meetings for small events up to the Tim Hortons Brier and the Royal Manitoba Winter Fair like we just hosted.” Schumacher: “It’s a pretty ridiculous number. It’s so many we stopped counting. It’s like McDonald’s - eventually you just stop adding numbers.” PREFERRED VENDOR n Westman Communications Group www.westmancom.com