BC Place Stadium tradeshow operators were breathing a sigh of relief after the Vancouver International Boat Show was thrown a lifeline last week.

The show was slated to sail on a shorter schedule last weekend following the provincial labour ministry's last-ditch efforts to end a stadium workers' strike - after organizers announced the show had been cancelled completely.

The rescheduled event was to be held over four days (Feb. 10-13) instead of the usual five days, with extended hours each day.

Pickets came down and workers returned to their jobs after the union and government agreed to a 48-hour cooling off period last week. After the intervention of B.C. Labour Minister Graham Bruce, a tentative collective agreement was reached Friday, and union members were expected to vote this week on the new deal.

Bayne Stanley, Business Edge
Union employees walk the BC Place Stadium picket line before agreeing to a cooling-off period.

Vancouver Golf and Travel Show organizers announced their event will proceed as planned from Friday (Feb. 18) until Sunday (Feb. 20).

Maggie Calloway, a spokeswoman for organizers of the Vancouver Home and Garden Show - slated to run Feb. 23-27 - says her group had discussed possible contingency plans before the resolution was announced.

"It's terrific - absolutely," says Calloway. "Talks were under- way. We were just waiting to see what was happening with the boat show."

Calloway says the home and garden show is expected to attract a crowd of 68,000. Last year, the event generated $107 million in revenue as $8.8 million worth of transactions occurred during the show, resulting in $98.3 million in follow-up sales.

"It's a union-management situation ... There's not a lot we can do as far as changing the situation, because they're union contracts," says Calloway.

Boat show organizers say the cancellation would have resulted in the loss of $35-$36 million in direct economic spin-offs. They had hoped to offset a decline of sales from the one day that was lost by extending the event's daily hours.

"We wished (a resolution) would have happened sooner, but a (four-day) show is better than nothing," says Aaron Fell, operations manager for Olympic Boat Centres, and a director of the B.C. Marine Trades Association (BCMTA), which owns the show.

Fell says the biggest pinch would likely be felt at the box office because attendance was expected to be lower than anticipated. The attendance decline would have an effect on the non-profit BCMTA, which uses boat show revenue to help fund projects such as pathways on shorelines and support for boating organizations.

Exhibitors rely on the show to generate 40 to 60 per cent of their annual sales.

The strike affected 20 full-time and 220 part-time B.C. Government Employees and Service Union workers who were seeking a three-year deal that included a $700 lump-sum payment in the first year and 2.5-per-cent raises in each additional year.

Fell says the total amount the union was seeking, worth approximately $100,000, was about the equivalent of the amount of provincial tax on the sale of one of his firm's yachts.

"We pay our tax dollars and we're paying our dividends and we were being held hostage by a (government) wage-freeze policy for the public sector," says Fell.

He says the province brokered a solution after realizing how many dollars were at stake. Citing a 2003 study conducted for the BCMTA, based on 2001 figures, Fell says the marine industry contributes $1.4-$1.6 billion annually to the B.C. economy and accounts for $467 million of the province's gross domestic product.

"I don't think that anyone knew the amount of income that was collected from a boat show like this," he says.

The union did what it had to do and the boat event happened to be the first trade show of the season, says Fell. But, after being subjected to a pair of labour disputes in the past four years, exhibitors were glad it was third-time lucky this time around.

Ironically, Fell expects the long-term effects to be more positive than negative.

"The amount of media attention on the marine industry has been huge," says Fell, adding the strike made people much more aware of the boat industry's economic importance. Anyone involved in the marine industry, whether they're selling boats or fishing tackle boxes, will benefit from the increased exposure, he adds.

The boat show, which featured 250 exhibits, was saved when the union and province agreed to the cooling-off period on negotiations, allowing for workers to return to their setup jobs. But the show was delayed a couple of days because a monster truck show from the previous weekend was not fully cleared from the stadium before pickets went up.

The marine event's attendance was expected to be down from the anticipated 40,000, says Laura Ballance, a spokeswoman for the show, operated by the National Marine Manufacturers Association. Declines in revenue would not be known until a later date, she adds.

"It would cost less to settle with the union than it would to lose a day of the boat show," says union spokesman Kevin Park.

He says a one-day strike during the 2001 boat show cost BC Pavilion Corp., a Crown corporation that operates the stadium, about $130,000.

The stumbling blocks were wages and concessions, he says. The median salary before the dispute was $13 per hour, while the bulk of workers, mostly hosts and cleaners, earned $11.87 per hour.

The employer's concessions, he says, included a 15-per-cent wage reduction for new hires and revised clauses on severance and parking fees.

Most employees park for free during events, but were asked to pay during peak demand periods.

(Monte Stewart can be reached at monte@businessedge.ca)