About Business in Vermilion
Vermilion: Big city advantages with a small town feel
Vermilion, Alberta is an exceptional town, with a population of 4472 people. From an outsider’s initial glance, it may appear to be just a small rural community, but if you look closer, you will realize that Vermilion, AB in fact boasts big-city advantages, while still maintaining that small town feel.
Vermilion’s historic downtown core has more than 90 businesses. The many long-established businesses, along with new ventures and expanding enterprises, are indicators of a vital and progressive commercial core.
Given Vermilion geographical location, businesses who locate here can utilize this strategic location to better their company growth and profitability.
Vermilion Business Advantages
A strong advantage to business growth is the non-residential development incentive program available to commercial and industrial businesses; its purpose is to encourage new development and expansion of non-residential facilities within the Town of Vermilion. This program offers a tax cancellation on the municipal portion of property taxes.
The vermilion economy is largely service industry to agriculture, with the area of oil and gas servicing growing in its presence. Industries and businesses in Vermilion thrive as a result of:
- competitive selection,
- competitive pricing, and
- commitment to service excellence.
Vermilion boasts an experienced labour force, large trading population, low employment rate and a range in business and occupations.
- Total experienced labour force: 2,010
- Trading population: 11,000 +
- Unemployment rate: 3.7%
Come see for yourself how your business can capitalize on the opportunities of a small town with big-city advantages.
The History of the Vermilion & District Chamber of Commerce
The Vermilion and District Chamber of Commerce had its beginning in 1906. Founded originally as Vermilion Board of Trade, it had as its president H.W. Brown who served in this capacity for four terms, 1906 to 1909. Mr. Brown was then in partnership with Walter Gibson in the North-West Trading Company Store.
A quote from the Vermilion Standard July21 1955, issue in its salute to their Golden Jubilee observance states: “The Vermilion Board of Trade in unique in its record of service. Since 1906, never has the promotional work which it was founded, been allowed to lapse. Throughout the first years’ history of Vermilion, the Board of Trade has always been the leader in projects contributing to the progress of the town and district, and to the welfare of the people.”
A few interesting facts include the youngest president, Gerald Stephens; and keeping up-to-date with our times, Maxine Sweeney was the first lady-president.
The name “Board of Trade” was changed to “Chamber of Commerce” in 1931, then back to “Board of Trade” in 1933. In later years it was again changed to ” Chamber of Commerce” and has remained with that title to the present time.
The following has been said, “The Vermilion Board of Trade, a community organization dedicated to the progress of the town and district, was established in 1906, and is thus in a position to recoganize the vauable contribution the pioneers of Vermilion. They built better than they knew, for their hard work, foresight and initiative, followed by the progress of their successors, have placed Vermilion among the foremost towns in Alberta.”
Following is a list of past president:
| 1906-1909 | H.W. Brown | 1910 | D.L. Freeman |
| 1911 | W.J. Seed | 1912-1913 | J. Dawson Stephens |
| 1914-1915 | J.A.M. Craig (John) | 1916-1919 | Sir James Outram |
| 1920-1921 | W.B. Nellis | 1922-1923 | A.E. Kaiser |
| 1924 | S.R.P. Cooper | 1925-1926 | W.H. Harper |
| 1927 | C.B. Johnston | 1928-1930 | W.H. Harper |
| 1931-1933 | Dr. H.W. Scott | 1934-1936 | Chas Robinson |
| 1937-1938 | W.P. Pilkie (Bill) | 1939-1940 | A.M. West (Albert) |
| 1941-1942 | Gerald Stephens | 1943-1944 | Ashley Cooper |
| 1945 | J.D. Adams (Jim) | 1946 | E.M. Stewart (Elmore) |
| 1947 | George S. Maxwell | 1948 | Melvin Hill |
| 1949 | A.M. Watts (Sandy) | 1950 | Tom Watts |
| 1951 | D.R. Mitchell (Reg) | 1952 | G.W. Sutherland |
| 1953 | R.G. Chalmers (Keith) | 1954 | K.G. Urquhart (Ken) |
| 1955 | Dr. A. Ben King | 1956 | J.R. Boaks (Ross) |
| 1957-1958 | E.A. Locke (Al) | 1959 | J.V. Kneale (Jack) |
| 1960 | Angus MacMillan | 1961 | Ernie Clendenning |
| 1962 | Aldous Kent | 1963 | John Webb |
| 1964-1966 | Claude Underdown | 1967 | Dr. A.R. Anderson |
| 1968 | John Stewart | 1969 | Grover Halterman |
| 1970 | William Milne | 1971 | Roger Rowe |
| 1972 | W. Tennant (Bill) | 1973 | Lloyd Seath |
| 1974 | Ben Buchmann | 1975 | Bob Richardson |
| 1976 | W.T. Garnet | 1977 | Chuck Payne |
| 1978 | Ted Etherington | 1979 | Monty Audenart |
| 1980-1981 | Stan Stewart | 1982 | Byron Moore |
| 1984 | Wayne Meikle | 1985 | Maxine Sweeney |
| 1986 | Ed Lee | 1987 | Kevin MacDuff |
| 1988 | Gary Horan | 1989-1990 | Jim Williams |
| 1991-1992 | Beryl Tovell | 1993-1994 | Dave Webb |
| 1995-1996 | Don Charron | 1997-1998 | Craig Brown |
| 1999 | Dawn Flaata | 2000-2001 | Shirley Schwartz |
| 2002-2003 | Angela Mergl | 2004-2005 | Greg Throndson |
| 2006 | Dan Macpherson | 2007-2008 | Jason Long |
| 2009-2012 | Marlene Beattie |
2012 Executive
PRESIDENT:
Marlene Beattie
1st VICE PRESIDENT:
Scott Kovatch
2nd VICE PRESIDENT
Eugene Wasylik
TREASURER:
Colleen Myhre
EXECUTIVE:
Shaun Jacula
Meagan Mueller
Sharon Williams
Wanda Evens
Mark Bulter
Office Manager
Anna Giesbrecht
