Winter Shake-Up Testimonial

We hired Wild Heart Collective to take the lead in planning and running the Winter Cities Shake-Up Festival and Market which was held in Churchill Square in Edmonton on January 30, 2015. It had performers, retail vendors, a beverage garden, fat bike test riding, food trucks, public art with creative lighting, and the first ever snow slide on the stairs. Between 2500-3500 people enjoyed this event.

We had a relatively small budget for this event and not a lot of lead time to put it together. Wild Heart Collective staff were willing to devote a lot of energy to exploring creative options for programming at the festival which was very much appreciated as the theme of the event was “shaking things up”.

They were able to draw upon their existing great working relationships with vendors, performers and audio-visual and other service providers to make the event more of a success. They also were able to secure additional sponsorship for specific elements of the event, which was critical to keeping the event within budget.

Wild Heart Collective were always willing to listen to the ideas of the planning team and were excellent at keeping the communication channels open before, during and after the event. They produced a final report with key learning which will help us for planning future similar events. The Winter Cities Shake-Up Festival and Market is now a prime example of winter place-making in the city, and this is in large part, due to their hard work and buy-in to the vision we shared with them. We would gladly hire Wild Heart Collective again. It is a pleasure to work with such passionate and also professional people who can deliver results in a short time with limited resources.

-Susan Holdsworth - - WinterCity Coordinator Wintercity City of Edmonton