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As temperatures began to dip (and we even saw a bit of snow!), the DBBA continued to work hard to keep downtown running ship-shape! This week we'd like to talk a little bit about our daily work, that often doesn't get noticed. We like to feature special projects that we are working on in these updates, but much of the work that we do is done daily. For example, we provide excellent everyday customer service - this means that we answer questions and provide guidance - responding to phone calls, emails, website forms and (in non-COVID times) office drop-by's to help drive traffic into Downtown Bend. This includes answering questions about directions, parking, specific businesses, products, restaurants, and all sorts of other things. In some ways, we operate as Downtown's visitor's center. We also provide marketing for Downtown Bend every single day. This means posts on our social media, engagement and comment management on social media & content creation for all of our platforms. We also do 100% of our website management in-house, and we are working every day to improve our website and better reflect our businesses and downtown community. On-the-street cleaning, litter-removal, sidewalk sweeping, graffiti and sticker removal, and business safety checks are all services that we perform every single day, 365 days per year. And that's not all - we also run the Downtown Dollars program every day - issuing, mailing and delivering Downtown Dollar gift certificates to keep money flowing into our Downtown. With a staff of only 2.5 people, we accomplish a tremendous amount of work. All of these daily services are provided plus special projects, events, decorations, advocacy and more! The Downtown Bend Business Association is committed to increasing the vitality of Downtown Bend!  Much of our time and energy this week was spent launching our Small Business Passport Event and collecting and creating prize baskets for the winners. This event takes an abundance of labor to put together and make possible, but we are happy to report that it has officially been launched and we are excited to see people in downtown getting their passports stamped. We can't wait to raffle off our six prize baskets with amazing products and gift cards from our local merchants. The raffle will take place on Small Business Saturday, November 28th, 2020. We would like to thank all of our participating merchants who made this event possible.  Unfortunately we had to cancel our Wreath Spruce-up Ball due to the increasing numbers of COVID19. This event would have allowed a group of volunteers to come together and beautify the wreaths that hang in Downtown Bend. As many of us have had to do in a multititle of ways since COVID19, this was a quick plot shift and the DBBA had to shift gears quickly to find a way to get a plethora of wreaths cleaned, fluffed, and redecorated so that they could be installed in Downtown Bend. DBBA Staff and Board rallied together to make this happen. This included board and staff taking wreaths home to complete the job. We'd like to give a big shout-out to aos Skincare and Spa and The Wine Shoppe in Downtown Bend - two businesses and board members who really came to the rescue - taking wreaths home to decorate and then bringing them back to be installed in Downtown Bend. Thank you!  This week, we were also happy to provide all of our merchants the opportunity to advertise at a discounted rate in the The Downtown Bend Holiday Gift Guide in The Source. Every year we provide this service, and it always creates a great booklet that features the best of Downtown Bend. Working with local advertisers to get great rates for our businesses is one of the services we love to offer. DBBA staff also often puts on their 'sales' hats to sell advertising (whether it's in a publication, on a kiosk, for an event, or for our banner program). We are committed to not only finding & providing the best rates to promote our Downtown businesses, but also in increasing DBBA streams of revenue to supplement our EID funding.  We also prepared for winter snow removal in Downtown Bend by getting our snow blowers into the shop to have their regular maintenance completed, making sure that all of our snow shovels, & supplies were ready to go and stocking up on necessities like ice melt! In the photo on the left you can see DBBA staff removing snow by the fountain on the corner of Lava and Minnesota in Downtown Bend. The DBBA has two snow blowers, and ATV with a snow plow and a plethora of snow shovels to make sure that downtown sidewalks stay clear no matter how much snow falls. The DBBA's mission is to increase the vitality of Downtown Bend!
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