Three new businesses introduced at Chamber meeting
September 22, 2025, 8:37 am
Nicole Taylor, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter
Three new businesses were introduced at the Moosomin Chamber of Commerce meeting on Tuesday.
Cara Grant with Trends Mercantile, was introduced. Trends Mercantile is the newest business on Main Street in the downtown business district and serves coffee and treats, and sells local handmade items.
Envision Counselling was also introduced. Envision Counselling recently announced they would be providing services in Moosomin once they find a counsellor for the town.
“We are a non-profit counselling service,” said Lynda Rideout with Envision. “We will be providing counselling for individuals and adults that are seeking some kind of support in their life as soon as we can find a counsellor.”
Gee Bee Construction was also introduced. Gee Bee is based in Kiping and recently bought Margetts Construction, with Keith Margetts staying on to run their business in the Moosomin area.
“We’re super excited to be in Moosomin,” said Shelley Batters with Gee Bee.
“We’re very excited to be in the area, it’s been in the works for a little bit that we were hoping to move this way, so we’re very happy to make a connection with Keith and bring him on board here to run the area.
“We are quite a well established company. We just celebrated 60 years. My dad started the company 60 years ago in June, so it has been quite a year for us.”
““If you’re not familiar, we do everything and anything to do with earth moving,” added Mathew Bonville. “We build roads, lagoons, we do repairs in the oil field quite a bit. A couple years ago we were everywhere from Gretna, Manitoba to the Northwest Territories and British Columbia, but we prefer the small town and keeping everything local, keeping everything within the town that we are in, so we look forward to being here.”
Spookarama update
Tegan Matichuk with McNaughton High School and Lenora Griemann with the Moosomin RCMP also gave an update to Chamber members on plans for this year’s Spookarama dance. Spookarama is held on Halloween night each year for students in Grades 6-12.
“Spookarama has been a long standing tradition at McNaughton High School and in the Community of Moosomin,” said Matichuk. “This year, Halloween falls on a Friday, so these tend to be some of our larger events, as opposed to when Spookarama and Halloween fall on a Tuesday or a Wednesday.
“We really appreciate this opportunity that is supported so well by business community in Moosomin. It not only provides our students with a positive experience on Halloween, it can curve some of those negative actions and behaviors that could potentially happen on Halloween evening.
“We do always want to bring on more community members for our Spookarama committee. Having a more people helping to make decisions is a plus, always, and chaperones for that evening is something I know we are always in need of.
Teachers tend to handle the school-based dances, and we need community members to chaperone at this dance which happens off of school property.
“Over the last few years we have done quite a bit of canvasing of businesses where students will come around and speak to different local establishments about what Spookarama is and how they can contribute. You’ll see some of my SRC students and our advisors around, over the next little bit, but this year we are also going to add a second component to it where we are going to try and send some things digitally in case we are not able to make face-to-face contact, because sometimes we end up with a lot of paper, and when we get there at 3:30 or 4 o’clock, that the business is already shut for the day or closed for whatever reason. This way we are hoping to get information out to everybody.”
“I think one of the reasons why Spookarama came about is because of all the mischief and vandalism that happened,” adds Griemann. “The RCMP along with the high school came up with the idea of Spookarama. Since 1980 this has been going on. This is a long-time event, with the community’s support, because we can give prizes out all night to the kids.
“It keeps them in the area, then we track who comes in and who goes out at what time and it helps a lot. We have noticed a decrease of the mischief and vandalism. Hopefully that can continue on.
“If your business is able to make a donation, the school is the one who does the canvassing and we have collection points in town or else the RCMP, accepts them.”
EDC update
Moosomin Economic Development Officer Casey McCormac gave an update on what the EDH has been up to lately.
“We used to be Moosomin Economic Development, we are now Gateway Economic Development because we have combined with the Town of Rocanville and the RM of Rocanville, so we are trying to take a more regional approach,” she told Chamber members.
“The biggest thing we are working on right now is a 10-year regional growth and economic development plan. We are working with Aaron Murray and David Froh of Derek Murray and Associates out of Regina to help develop that plan. We started doing interviews just on Zoom with people in the community trying to figure out what’s needed in the community, what’s wanted, and our priorities for the future. Once complete, this plan will provide a clear road map for growth with measurable goals and milestones to track progress. It will help us be proactive rather than reactive, ensuring that we’re moving forward strategically and setting ourselves up for long-term success.
“Another project that we are working on is a Google business sudit project to ensure that local businesses have accurate information on their Google business profiles. I know a lot of people when they drive by a community, they just use Google, so we’re ensuring that everyone is up to date. Once I get through all of that, each business will receive a report with anything that can help them improve their visibility.”
McCormac also updated businesses on where Moosomin stands in terms of meeting its goals under the housing accelerator initiative which sees $30,000 given out for any new residential development, and $8,000 for each additional door in multi unit properties.
“A little update on our housing accelerator fund initiative, we’re progressing really well and we are on track to hit our 43 units within the next couple of weeks,” she said. “We needed to complete those by 2027 and we are looking to be complete this year. We have really done well with that.”
