Now in its eighth year, What’s the Big Idea helped launch seven new businesses in 2023 ranging from landscaping to retail to fine art. The event combines entrepreneurs pitching their ideas to funders with presentations from professional organisations on topics such as finance and marketing.

"It's really great to bring entrepreneurs together with support agencies,” said Neepawa Economic Development Officer Marilyn Crewe, “and the support of the event sponsors and award sponsors just makes it a successful event for the businesses for all the effort that they make to do their pitches."

Businesses at this year’s event included Stellar Apparel clothing store, the Little Garden Next Door vertical wall gardens, Hid’n Hollow toy store, Authentic Skin medical grade skin care, ETV Yard Services, Katy Martin Fine Art, and an as-yet-unnamed vintage bowling alley resurrection. Five pitches came from the Neepawa area and two from Minnedosa. The event was originally a collaboration between the Neepawa and Minnedosa economic development offices but for the past couple years has been held in Neepawa.

Entrepreneurs had a lot of different reasons for wanting to pitch at the event. For some, like Belinda Critchlow of Hid’n Hollow, the event was a marketing tool for her young business which soft launched just before Christmas of 2022. For others, like Kristen Clark of Authentic Skin and Katy Martin, the event was a chance to connect with and learn from the experiences from other entrepreneurs, whether they were new like themselves or established like keynote speaker Rob Moman of This N That Manufacturing.

Crewe was very pleased with the success of this year’s event, which saw the number of participants increase from last year, and is already looking forward to what we’ll see next year. Since the event began in 2015, 50 businesses have been awarded almost $80,000 to support the launch and expansion of businesses in the region.