How Day Daze Helps the Chamber Grow
There has been rumors and general talk about trying to bring back – or revitalize – the Janesville Chamber of Commerce here in town. For the past few years, it’s been somewhat of a sore subject.
Members believed to remain in the Chamber are seemingly only focused on the Hay Daze Committee, arguably the group’s most significant moneymaker, while anything and everything else a Chamber is supposed to do has fallen on the wayside due to lack of interest or confusion with how to get involved or what a Chamber is. It’s caused many to use the phrases “Janesville Chamber” and “Hay Daze Committee” interchangeably, some as a joke, others due to genuine confusion about whether the two are different.
We wanted to dig deep and determine whether the chamber and the committee were indeed one and the same or if there was a fundamental difference. We also consulted Waseca Area Chamber of Commerce Executive Director Ann Fitch on their activities and some informal discussions about Janesville having a branch of the Waseca Area Chamber to serve as its Chamber body.
Janesville Chamber member Chuck Quast explained why many think the Chamber and the Hay Daze Committee are one organization but technically are two separate entities. “This is how I explain it: the chamber is its own entity, and we run the Hay Daze committee underneath it. The Hay Daze has its own Facebook page, but we still run it under the umbrella of the chamber.”
There were talks of potentially discontinuing the Chamber or, at the very least, making the Hay Daze Committee an organization not tied to the Chamber. However, in a nutshell, they’d potentially lose the number of memberships they’ve accumulated through the Chamber. “We usually tell members that the money goes toward Hay Daze,” Quast explained.
The week-long town festival is by far the Chamber’s most notable moneymaker. Quast has been in charge of the music end of things since joining the Chamber and Hay Daze Committee nine years ago. With his hard work, as well as that of Laura Seys, Mike Cahill, and several others behind the scenes, Hay Daze has a reputation as one of the more prominent town celebrations in southern Minnesota.
“I’ll be in Owatonna for work, and I’ll hear people talking about Hay Daze,” Quast said. “I even knew people that came all the way from Rochester or out of state to come to our festival.”
Quast also shared that when he reached out to a band from the Twin Cities that he was scouting and considering to perform at Hay Daze, they said they had heard so much about it and “would absolutely love to play in Janesville.” “It turns out one of the band members went to college with a few guys in Janesville, and they stayed in touch,” he added.
Although Hay Daze is the Chamber’s main event, they also provide other things for Janesville, such as Christmas lights and an annual Easter Egg Hunt at JWP and Trinity Lutheran Schools. However, Quast would like to see at least one more annual event, like a luncheon, for members to attend and be social. He understands the hesitancy to do that since Laura Seys tried to organize a luncheon once, and very few people showed up.
While Janesville’s Chamber of Commerce does well at providing a stellar town festival, the Waseca Area Chamber of Commerce is an excellent example of their potential.
For example, this reporter didn’t quite understand the difference between a city’s Economic Development Authority and a Chamber; it seemed like two different groups doing the same thing. While they work toward the same goal to help businesses flourish, Fitch summarized that an EDA provides businesses with various opportunities to thrive in their respective cities; Janesville’s EDA has offered businesses revolving loan funds and storefront grants. However, a Chamber aims to promote businesses in the town or area and advocate for them. Fitch called it “cheerleading for the city.”
“We always say things like, ‘This is where you want to live; this is how you can achieve your goals here,’” she added. “We do plenty of advocacy work at the State Capitol, too.”
The Waseca Chamber does lobbying, but Fitch calls it “lobbying with a small l.” “We’re smaller, so other groups like Greater Mankato Growth have a dedicated lobbyist,” she said. “We’re usually only there for the bigger issues such as minimum wage increases or laws on sick leave times.”
Chambers are non-profits, notably a 5O1C6. It’s different from the more common 5O1C3 organizations out there, such as the Janesville Area Foundation. “Many people think the Chamber can do so much more than it does,” Fitch further explained. “However, a Chamber doesn’t have the deep pockets that municipalities like the City of Waseca do.”
What has helped the Waseca Chamber flourish is its membership with the Minnesota Chamber Executive and the Minnesota State Chamber. “That puts me in a network with other executive directors throughout the state,” Fitch said. “They’re all independent chambers, but having that group of colleagues to lean on and grab ideas from and a cohort you can talk to is so valuable. You’re not competing with any of them like you would be if you had a car dealership. It’s nice to have that sense of community.”
The Chamber also couldn’t do all the events it does without the businesses it supports giving back as well as having the community support. “It takes lots of resources to run a Chamber; it also takes a lot of community and business buy-in. We’re very fortunate here in Waseca to have both. Chamber members support us not only in dues but also in sponsorships. Every other year, we have an ambassador bash banquet where several people show up. We’re very thankful for our community; it strengthens us.”
With Waseca’s Chamber, you don’t even have to be a business to be a member. “Individuals are more than welcome, whether they’re retired from business or just in the know in the business community,” Fitch explained. “If a business CEO decides to become part of the chamber, that doesn’t mean they’re the only member of that business. If you work at a Chamber business, you’re a member, too.”
You don’t technically have to live in Waseca, either. Fitch shared that many Waseca Chamber members either have employees who live in Waseca or outside but still want to support the city and its goals.
At one point, there was an informal discussion about Janesville being within the sphere of the Waseca Area Chamber of Commerce. Fitch said that if there was enough interest, she’d be more than willing to explore the option of having a part-time staff member of Waseca’s Chamber in Janesville.
However, with the town’s continual growth (it is potentially the only town in Waseca County still growing past 2020), many may want a more independent Chamber, something to call our own. EDA members have held a business social already, something that Quast hinted that the Janesville Chamber could do. Perhaps the next business social will involve the Chamber.
“If I were a business owner in Janesville, I would personally think if we had a cocktail hour, that would be great,” he said. “We may not necessarily need a speaker to talk about businesses, but maybe have the mayor or superintendent talk to the business owners and say, ‘This is where your tax dollars are going.’ I haven’t had kids in school for over two years. So that would be something that’d interest me. I’d mainly want our guest speakers to be local.”
The hardest part is finding people to run it. But again, the EDA has been at-bat for something like this for months. One other meeting was organized at Burns Sales and Service a few years ago. If businesses, residents, and even the current Chamber members want a more active Chamber, it is possible. All that needs to happen is for those interested to be actively invested and organize events instead of subtly supporting the efforts on the sidelines.
