Sarah Freeman, Executive Director, Bow Valley Chamber of Commerce

Key Outcomes

•  100% of participants reported increased willingness to integrate emergency readiness into their business planning

• 80% gained strategies to reopen faster after disruption
• 90% developed a stronger understanding of the risks facing their business

Assessing Business Preparedness for Disruptions and Crises

Small businesses in the Bow Valley operate in one of the most beautiful yet most disruption-prone regions in Canada. Wildfires, floods, and power outages mean that readiness isn’t just a nice-to-have; it’s indispensable. At the same time, most small businesses are already stretched thin and working on preparedness is often overwhelming. Many of them don’t know where to start.

Seeing the Jasper community navigate the aftermath of wildfires in 2024 and advocate for businesses in its region inspired Sarah to work on a plan for organizations in the Bow Valley. She knew the knowledge existed. Many businesses were already tackling emergency preparedness and doing it well. The question was how to tap into that knowledge and make it accessible to the community without having to reinvent the wheel.

RIC delivered the Ready, Set, Resilient!™ workshop—a successful session that guided businesses through readiness assessments and priority setting as well as how to strengthen recovery efforts. All participants who completed the post-workshop survey reported increased willingness to integrate disaster preparedness into their business planning. They also committed to taking at least one preparedness action in the next 30 days.

The Bow Valley Chamber of Commerce is a nonprofit, membership-driven organization that supports businesses in the Bow Valley region of Southern Alberta. It plays a vital role in the local economy by helping businesses thrive through connection, grow through opportunity, and flow with sustainable momentum. The Chamber provides practical support, strategic advocacy, and a collaborative network that strengthens the Bow Valley business community.

With a small team of two, the Chamber is often in search of collaborations that make it possible to expand the organization’s impact and serve its community without having to build from scratch.

BVCC currently serves 317 members and recently opened up a new Microbusiness Membership for businesses with annual revenue less than $30,000. The organization hosts events like Business Excellence Awards, Un-Golfed, and Women in Business. It also recently launched The Summit Table, an in-person peer-to-peer mentorship program for women in business.

Sarah Freeman, Executive Director of the Bow Valley Chamber of Commerce, has seen risk become real. When devastating wildfires tore through nearby Jasper in 2024, the community’s businesses struggled to respond and recover.

“That was close to home,” says Sarah. “Seeing the Jasper Chamber navigating that made us realize some kind of plan needs to be in place.”

Closer to the Bow Valley, power outages and other disruptions were already testing local operations, underscoring the need for emergency preparedness.

Small businesses are the backbone of local economies, yet they are often the most vulnerable to disruption. Without preparation, a single event can trigger prolonged closures, job losses, reduced local services, and slower recovery across an entire community.

For Sarah and her team, the lesson was clear. Bow Valley businesses needed to get serious about emergency readiness. But that clarity immediately raised a more difficult question: where do you even begin?

 With 317 member businesses across the region, the Chamber wanted to support preparedness at scale. Yet neither the organization nor most of the businesses in the area had the expertise to know what “prepared” looked like in practice.

 “First, the board needed awareness,” Sarah says. “They needed clarity on what we would do as a team, and how that could extend into something meaningful for the broader business community without reinventing the wheel. I knew other organizations were already doing this well. The question was, how do we tap into that?”

Sarah was familiar with RIC Disaster Management’s work with other businesses across the region. She had seen the work the consulting firm did to help the Town of Canmore identify and close emergency preparedness gaps. That track record gave Sarah confidence that RIC could deliver practical and credible information.

At the same time, Sarah wanted the Chamber to do more than just bring in an expert. In addition to giving businesses an understanding of where to start on emergency preparedness, she wanted to create a space for business owners and senior leaders from organizations across different sectors to learn from one another and hear different perspectives. 

“I felt our business community needed something like this,” says Sarah. “And I automatically thought of Rebecca because I know what she is doing and I see the impact of her work.”

Once the decision was made, the process moved quickly. Rebecca was collaborative and quick to respond to communication from the BVCC team when organizing the workshop. 

“She was very professional and wanted to get out the right content,” Sarah says. “We barely had to ask her for things. She was proactively sharing what we needed.”

The Ready, Set, Resilient!™ workshop brought together 12 business leaders from diverse sectors, including tourism, hospitality, real estate, professional services, and health and wellness. It was part of a three-part learning pathway in RIC’s Bounce Back Biz™series. Each workshop is designed to stand alone or be delivered as a progressive series guiding participants through awareness and planning to practical action.

Through guided assessment tools and collaborative table work, participants in the Ready, Set, Resilient!™ workshop identified their vulnerabilities, gaps, and risks, prioritized action steps, and built confidence in their ability to prepare.

In line with Sarah’s initial goals, the format also created space for peer learning. Participants were able to share ideas, compare experiences, and talk about issues they hadn’t considered before. 

“Everybody appeared to feel fairly comfortable,” says Sarah. “I loved how Rebecca kept things moving. We didn’t get stuck in the weeds.”

By the end of the session, participants left not only with new insights, but with a clearer sense of what to do next and the confidence to begin their journey on preparing for disaster or crisis.

Post-workshop survey results from 10 participants revealed significant shifts:

• 100% reported increased willingness to integrate emergency readiness into their business planning
• 90% gained a stronger understanding of the risks facing their business
• 80% reported increased confidence in taking practical preparedness actions
• 100% said readiness now feels more manageable and less overwhelming
• 100% committed to taking at least one preparedness action within 30 days
• 80% gained strategies to reopen faster after a disruption

The workshop moved participants beyond awareness and into practical, actionable readiness, supporting both business continuity and local economic resilience.

“I know just by listening to people in that space that people walked away with something,” says Sarah.

With clear frameworks and practical tools in hand, participants now had a structured way to organize their thinking and the realization that preparedness doesn’t have to be overwhelming.

What Participants Said

“As a small business owner, the Ready, Set, Resilient!™ workshop was the ideal starting point for developing a clear disaster response and recovery plan. Planning for emergencies in my business felt daunting, and I hadn’t even considered the importance of a recovery plan before attending this workshop. I’m now excited to move forward and enrol in the Disaster to Dynamo workshop, where I’ll leave with a tangible plan to ensure my team and I are prepared for anything.”

• Laura Dowling, Director/Guide, Canadian Rockies Experience

“As a small business owner, it’s easy to focus on daily tasks and overlook real risks. The Ready, Set, Resilient!™ workshop by RIC was a powerful reminder of how important preparedness truly is. Rebecca helped us think beyond small disruptions and consider bigger events—like fires, floods, or illness—and how they could impact our operations. Her clear, practical approach made it easy to identify our own vulnerabilities and start planning.”

• Sara Maitre, Co-Founder, Argan Springs