Fire, floods and Fulford-Ganges Road construction notwithstanding, 2025 brought a bump in visits to the Salt Spring Island Visitor Information Centre (VIC) — a 30 per cent increase in centre visitors over the previous year.
And those nearly 10,000 visitors were mostly greeted by volunteer ambassadors, according to VIC steering committee member Elaine Senkpiel, who said the committee trains and schedules community members interested in helping out — they have a roster of 41 currently — and is always recruiting.
Even on a winter day, there is action at the VIC. People stop by to take pictures with their phones of constantly-updated daily and weekly event boards, they grab maps of hiking and walking trails. And they watch a slideshow on one of the centre’s TV screens — featuring pictures of the island from the Salt Spring Photography Club. Some are captioned, some are not; the staff identify places that catch visitors’ eyes and direct them to the relevant point of interest.
“We promote all things Salt Spring,” said Senkpiel. “Arts, culture, entertainment, adventure, recreation. We see people in person, we handle email inquiries, we talk on the telephone.”
While almost every visitor plans their trip online from home, once “on the ground” at their destination there’s no substitute for a brick-and-mortar location, according to VIC steering committee member Brigitte Diebold. The centre is currently staffed three hours a day, seven days a week — the more volunteers they have, the more they’re open.
“Online research, QR codes and so on are all great if you are starting your trip,” she said, “but once in the location, we find people want to hear a story — they want to find that special place on the island maybe nobody else knows about, or even just something they’ve never seen before. That’s the experience we’re giving.”
The Salt Spring Island Chamber of Commerce is the sponsoring organization, Senkpiel said, with the VIC itself operating as an official Destination BC facility. That means all volunteers undertake training through a provincial online learning centre program — facilitated now by volunteer certified training coordinator Dave Rumsey — and do 20 hours of “shadowing” with an experienced ambassador.
“We’re one of 134 centres in B.C. under the Visitor Services Network Program umbrella,” said Diebold. “The mandate and the reporting line comes directly from Destination BC — they’re giving information to us, making sure we have the right training, setting standards for how we operate.”
Volunteer training includes taking part in one of several periodic “familiarization tours,” where businesses have reached out to the centre to have VIC staff come visit — to ensure they’re familiar with what each has on offer. Senkpiel says those tours are always popular, and she finds information flows in both directions — the participating businesses learn about one another, too.
The VIC team last year covered 1,239 hours at the centre — almost 43 per cent more time than the previous year — welcoming visitors that were overwhelmingly from elsewhere in Canada. Just 15.8 per cent were foreign tourists, according to VIC data — about half from the U.S. and the remainder mostly from Europe, Asia and Australia.
And a full 26 per cent of visitors identify as local — specifically from Salt Spring Island.
“Someone who has lived here a long time might wonder what could be in here for them,” said Senkpiel. “Maybe they just stopped in because they have visitors coming — but they’ll always discover new things they didn’t know about.”
In addition to visitor statistics that go into the Destination BC portal, that affiliation with a larger body means VIC volunteers spend some time promoting the rest of our beautiful province alongside Salt Spring — and while they’re the first to admit they’re not equipped to plan someone’s whole vacation, centre volunteers tend to have a lot more regional knowledge than one might think.
Senkpiel told a story about an off-season visit from a New Zealand couple planning a driving loop around the province, who found themselves delightfully chatting for nearly an hour with VIC volunteers — and wound up with all kinds of ideas for places to visit on Vancouver Island and beyond.
“I’ve camped a lot with my little travel trailer,” laughed Senkpiel. “And that’s actually been very helpful in my role here, because I can say ‘oh, if you’re in Osoyoos, you should stop into the Burrowing Owl winery,’ or whatever. A lot of us have travelled a fair bit, and we can share that information with people who come in.”
Interestingly, some 42 per cent of parties tracked were Salt Spring “day trippers,” with 44 per cent staying one to three nights; only 13 per cent were staying more than a week. For those quick-trip visitors in particular, the centre becomes a valuable resource the moment they arrive.
“They take the bus from Fulford, land at our bus shelter and go, ‘what can I do for the day?’” said Senkpiel. “Or they come in on Harbour Air or Seair, and don’t have a plan — so they end up exploring the village. We’re hoping that they’ll see, for example, ‘oh, the Apple Festival is on at the end of the month,’ and they say to themselves they should come back.”
When they’re not open, there are brochures in a rack outside, and they’re working on replacing it with one that’s more protected from the elements. Always taped in the window are easily viewable bus and ferry schedules — and Dave Paul from the Fritz pops by as often as he can to post what’s showing at the theatre, Senkpiel said.
“We operate on such a shoestring budget,” said Senkpiel. “It’s amazing the volunteers have done as well as they have over the years with the limited resources they’ve had.”
Local businesses often help fill those gaps. One grocery store stepped up last summer to fund a summer student program that greatly boosted daytime staffing, Senkpiel said — they’re also responsible for the parade of fresh flowers that greet visitors nearly as enthusiastically — and the other donates funds for supplies for centre volunteers themselves.
“It’s wonderful how the community supports us as we’re supporting them,” she said. “We couldn’t operate and do what we do without the donations we’ve had. We are here for everyone; we’re all working together.”
Senkpiel said apart from a call for ever-more volunteers — reach out to 250-537-5252 to sign up — the message for islanders today was to stop in soon to update the VIC’s supply of pamphlets, brochures and business cards. Event notices should be half page size, she added, so everything fits when it gets busier — and when they bring materials in, year-round, they can always update their hours with staff for the VIC’s information boards.
“Bring in your flyers soon, because the busy season starts fast,” said Diebold. “We’re seeing travel coming in earlier and in higher numbers than last year, and I think we’re only going to see more this year.”
