ELORA – It’s only a 90-minute drive from Toronto, you’ve got to check out this village.
That’s a mantra often repeated by bloggers and social media influencers when talking about Elora.
It’s something you might hear a little more often as you scroll through TikTok or Instagram as a huge marketing campaign aims to attract hundreds of influencers during the coming weeks making content that is said will put millions of eyes on Elora and make it a known Christmastime destination.
Part of this campaign includes influencers being given “magic sprinkles” that act as cash at the same value as real money for them to spend at participating stores. Businesses are later compensated for 50 per cent, for example a business that brought in $100 in magic sprinkles would get $50.
This is one part of a $250,000 marketing campaign financed by Kat Florence Canada.
Kat Florence is an international jewelry design company owned by Elora native Kristy Hillis and has been buying up historic buildings along with her husband Don Kogen in downtown Elora including the Gorge Cinema, the Dalby House, the Metcalfe and the Elora Mews.
Their latest project, the new Elora Christmas Market, features vendors in wooden huts on a new cobblestone pathway with fire pits near the Elora Mews is largely at the centre of all this but it's not the only focus.
In a phone interview, Kogen said it’s the right time to promote Elora as a Christmas destination.
“We have the lights, we have the beautiful shops, we have this new 12,000-square-foot walkway that we’ve made basically with cobblestone and we put out five fire tables,” Kogen said. “This is a good time to promote it to the Ontario market and bring awareness to what we have in Elora which is unified lights all the way up the street, beautification across the board.”
He clarified the campaign is largely being handled by a Toronto-based agency called Strategy House, owned by Steph Jarvis.
Jarvis stressed the influencers are not paid and are under no obligation to make content, tag or promote. The influencers are not even aware they are getting the magic sprinkle money ahead of time and are surprise gifts when they arrive at a designated location, she said.
“No different than how my restaurant clients invite these people in exchange for hopeful sharing on social media but it’s never guaranteed,” Jarvis said.
Jarvis said the influencers she’s reached out to span across “genres” such as food and drink, lifestyle, fashion and travel.
Despite being under no obligation to post, influencers have been making content in Elora anyways.
“The fact that they’re pushing these, not just one story but multiple posts and stories to tens and hundreds of thousands of people per account I think shows the quality of Elora,” Jarvis said.
It’s not just Kat Florence businesses that are involved in this as Elora BIA members were offered to be a part and accept the magic sprinkles should they choose to.
Elora BIA chair and The Evelyn restaurant owner Maclean Hann wanted to clarify in a phone interview there is no BIA or township funding behind this campaign.
“I think a campaign of this magnitude will be very positive for the downtown of Elora because it’s the kind of marketing dollars that the BIA could never afford,” Hann said. “It brings a lot of profile to our very small community.”
About 20 businesses are part of this campaign so far but Hann stressed BIA members were under no obligation to be part of this.
“Some of the businesses that aren’t participating, it just financially may not make sense for them to do so,” Hann said.
The influencer campaign is ultimately just one part of this campaign, Kogen said, which will also include digital billboard ads and a full page in the Toronto Star.
In her time working in marketing, Jarvis said she’s never been involved in a project with a couple who have put so much of their own funding into a “community connected project before because they believe in that place so much.”
“Coming into the holidays, it’s a really nice community story with a lot of generosity and community working together behind it, it’s been a really warm project for all of us working on it,” she said.
