By Erik Van Drunen
As a new crop of local politicians gets ready to head to Parliament Hill and Ottawa City Hall, many local business owners will be heading to the bank.
Elections give many businesses an unexpected financial boost and this year was no exception. Three elections in November meant an increase in the rental of office space, campaign headquarters were filled with leased office equipment and printers and sign makers were kept busy producing rush orders.
Ada and Wilf Laham, owners of Ada’s Diner on Bank Street, say having NDP candidate Heather-jane Robertson’s campaign office across the street proved very good for business.
“As soon as that office got up and running, business here picked up a lot,” Ada Laham says. “Visitors to the office came in and so did the volunteers that worked there. We close at six, so people that were working there in the evenings would hurry over to get in before we closed.”
Hawley Signs and Graphic of Gloucester is one sign-making business that reaped the rewards of concurrent municipal, school board and federal campaigns.
Eleanor Hawley, the company’s owner and operator, says they made over 30,000 corrugated plastic signs for a variety of local candidates.
“Overall we made fewer signs than in 1997, but having the elections so close together still kept us really busy,” Hawley explains. “I had to hire four more people to handle all the work that was coming in.
Normally we only work nine-to-five, but during elections everyone needs a lot of signs really quickly, so we had to add a midnight shift.”
Local office-supply stores have also benefited from the elections.
Steve Tanner, manager of Staples Business Depot at 403 Bank St., says any time there’s an event like an election in Ottawa, his store has increased sales.
“Election business is good business,” says Tanner. “We printed pamphlets for some of the campaigns and sold office furniture and office supplies for campaign headquarters. A year from now I’ll be looking at our sales numbers and asking myself why we did so well the year before.”
Maureen Knox, campaign manager for Beverley Mitchell, the Progressive Conservative candidate in Ottawa Centre, says keeping campaign business local is extremely important.
“It’s mandatory to give our business to local businesses,” she explains. “As much as possible, we tried to keep everything in Ottawa. Why would we take our business outside of the city that we want to be elected in?”
Even though election time made Ada’s Diner extra busy, Wilf Laham says he wouldn’t mind if elections happened more often.
“It would be way, way better for our business if elections happened more often,” he says.
But Hawley is grateful the elections are over. Although she loves her work, she says she doesn’t think she could cope with elections happening more frequently than they already do.
“I don’t think I could handle it,” she says. “I wouldn’t want elections to happen more than once every three years.”