CEO Departing NWT Tourism 

Dear Valued Members, Partners and Tourism Stakeholders,

I am writing on behalf of the Board of Directors to advise that regretfully, I have accepted the resignation of Cathie Bolstad, our Chief Executive Officer.  Cathie has advised that she will be leaving NWT Tourism at the end of December this year to pursue new projects and passions. 

The Board has established a Recruitment and Selection Committee, which I will lead and so you will see the position advertised in the near future.  Our goal is to have a new Chief Executive Officer hired before the year is concluded. I will update you on the selection of the new Chief Executive Officer once we have completed the hiring process. 

For those of you that may not know what Cathie’s contributions to NWT Tourism are, I would like to share with you a perspective from the Board of Directors.

Cathie joined NWT Tourism as our CEO in April 2014.  While the tourism industry was new for her, it was her broad experience in marketing, product development, stakeholder and community engagement, government relations, and project management that positioned her to lead our organization to new heights.  And, our Board unanimously agrees that she has done exactly that! Here are some highlights of her accomplishments and contribution to our organization and industry.

2014 – Established the NWT Conference Bureau and implementing a sales lead and bid tracking system to measure and report on the performance of the Bureau. At the end of March 2020, before COVID-19 had shut down business events and conferences, NWT Tourism had pursued conference business valued cumulatively at $23,070,000 through the preparation and submission of conference proposals $7,654,000 million in conferences had already occurred as a result of the NWT Conference Bureau’s marketing and sales activities.

2015 – Implemented electronic nomination and voting for the Board of Directors, increasing member participation in the selection of the Board and increasing regional participation on the Board.

2015/16 Developed and Delivered a 5-year Marketing Strategy called “Towards A $235 Million Dollar Tourism Industry” that has guided all of NWT Tourism’s annual marketing plans to stimulate growth of visitors and visitor spend in the NWT  over the past five years.

2015/16 – Led the NWT’s participation in the development of pan-territorial Business, Market, Trade (BMT) Ready standards for the tourism industry, delivering accessible training tools for online and in-person training to these standards.

2017 – NWT Tourism’s Secrets Campaign was named a national tourism marketing award finalist by the Tourism Industry Association of Canada.

2018 – Led an NWT delegation to China, established a new Marketing & Sales Agent for the Chinese market while there and came home to implement the Alipay marketing/payment platforms in Yellowknife with the Yellowknife Chamber of Commerce to facilitate increased expenditure by Chinse visitors.

2018 – Established a General Sales Agent in Australia to strengthen the NWT’s pursuit of this relatively new market for the NWT.

2018 - Signed an MOU with the Indigenous Tourism Association of Canada (ITAC) to formalize marketing collaboration, promoting Indigenous tourism and creating new marketing content together.

2019 - Led an industry sales mission to Mexico connecting Northwest Territories Trade Ready OTA’s (online travel agents), Tour Operators and Wholesalers. In total, NWTT and partners met with 12 businesses and trained 58 travel agents over 4 days. Trade-Ready tourism operators to travel agencies and training 56 agents on NWT product for the Mexican trses in Mexico.

2020 – Oversaw the establishment of a Triple R Framework to guide both the advocacy and marketing efforts that will ensure the Relief, Recovery and Resilience for our industry as it navigates through the COVID-19 pandemic.

NWTT’s overall destination marketing budget grew from $3.2 million to $4.4 million (37.5% over six years).  This reflects the trust and confidence by our key partners, the GNWT and the Canadian Northern Economic Development Agency (Cannor) in the project proposals put forward under Cathie’s leadership.

NWT Tourism’s funds for marketing from partnerships with private sector industry partners grew 46% over six years. This reflects our members and industry partners saw increased value in the partnerships offered by NWT Tourism.

By the end of August this year, NWT Tourism will have awarded eight scholarships valued at $1500 to NWT resident students studying in post secondary programs related to tourism and hospitality. And, this year we have introduced scholarships for Indigenous NWT students, to support the growth of Indigenous tourism.  Since first establishing the program in 2014, there is now a reserved Scholarship Fund valued at $31,600.00. 

All of these are highlights of the work accomplished by our staff under Cathie’s leadership.  I would be remiss if I didn’t highlight that the most recent measure for tourism visitation and visitor spend issued by the GNWT showed that in 2018/19 the NWT hosted 120,130 visitors who directly spent $210.3 million dollars in the territory.  Visitation to our territory has grown 42% over the past five years and visitor spend has grown by 43% over the same period.  Our organization is a contributor to this overall industry success and the work done by our staff, general sales agents, and contractors is something all of us can and should be proud of.

Finally, I know many of our members and government partners have experienced Cathie’s tireless advocacy on our industry’s behalf.  Cathie has worked on many regulatory and red tape matters for individual members and for our industry as a whole over her six years with us.  Her advocacy work is always focussed on making it easier for private sector to succeed while ensuring there is a lens on sustainable tourism and positive resident sentiment in a growing visitor economy.  Her most recent efforts have been focussed on advocacy for relief and recovery programs with both the federal and territorial government as our industry navigates the COVID-19 pandemic.   In all of these COVID-19 challenges, Cathie has been working with funding partners to reallocate marketing dollars to support relief and recovery programs for our industry so our industry can survive the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic. She is doing this work very strategically for our organization and for our industry.    Please take time to pause and thank Cathie for her contribution to our industry and to wish her well in her next adventures before she gets away on us later this year. 

Stay safe.  Stay strong.  Work together.

Harold Grinde
Chairperson
NWT Tourism