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Written by Kieran Delamont, Associate Editor, London Inc.
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Home Country revived as one-day event
Home County Music & Art Festival is back on ― sort of. The annual festival, which was cancelled this year as the organization running it grapples with financial challenges, is being revived as a one-day event at the London Brewing Co-operative. The Old East Village brewery will host two stages on August 24, featuring 10 acts, plus a selection of craft vendors and food trucks (think of it as a scaled-down version of the usual festival, held at a brewery.) Paul Tomlinson, acting chair of the Home County Folk League, told CTV News London that they were happy to partner up with London Brewing as an alternative to the big festival. “They have been our partners in our festival beer garden for a number of years, and co-hosted several events at their brewery,” he said. “Our two organizations share the same community spirit, allowing us to work well together.”
The upshot: London’s oldest festival is nothing if not a survivor, and the hope among organizers is that they can use this one-day event to raise some money that might help them move toward reviving the festival next year. (Admission, as with past festivals, will be pay-what-you-can, with all proceeds going to the Home County Future Fund.) However, the long-term prospects of the festival still remain fuzzy. Nothing ever came of the attempt back in February by Family Shows Canada (organizer of London Ribfest and London Children’s Festival) to revive the festival, a move that seemed to be made without the Home County Folk League’s involvement and was quickly scuttled. For now, the Folk League is still working to plot out its future independently and is hopeful that this year’s one-day event will help with that. “That’s money that we’ll hold in reserve to help us fund future events like this one, and perhaps even bigger and more frequent,” Tomlinson told CBC News London.
Read more: CBC News London | CTV News London
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Beerlab! London to expand and rebrand as Supply & Demand Beer and Pizza
Beerlab! London on Talbot Street is going through an overhaul, expanding to add a restaurant and pizza kitchen, and rebranding to Supply & Demand Beer and Pizza. It’s a lot of change all at once, but owners Adil Ahmad and Nick Baird believe it’s what they need to do to take on the economic climate downtown head on. “We’re trying to navigate those difficulties by offering more,” Baird told the Free Press. “Downtown just isn’t what it used to be. People are going out differently now. They’re not going out as frequently. They’re more cautious with their dollars, which is understandable.” The partners are expanding into the space formerly operating as London Wine Bar, which closed last February, and hope to open the space next month.
The upshot: There’s been no shortage of stories about businesses closing or moving on from downtown locations lately, so it’s nice to see a business doubling down on the core, despite the challenges. They’re also bucking the trends in the craft brewing and restaurant industries. 2024 has been shaping up to be a tough year for both: the Canadian Craft Brewers Association predicted at the start of 2024 that the country could lose “anywhere between 10 and 20 per cent” of its craft brewers, while Restaurants Canada was also predicting a gloomy year for food service. And, of course, it will be interesting to see what the brewmasters at Beerlab! ― a small-batch craft brewery that has never really hewed to the conventional ― come up with on the pizza side of the equation.
Read more: London Free Press
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Beware the Tenno!
Thousands of Tenno are coming to town this weekend for TennoCon 2024 ― the annual conference put on by Digital Extremes for its popular Warframe video game (“Tenno” is the name for players of, and in, the game). The big event of the weekend for players will be an update on the coming Warframe: 1999 expansion, hotly anticipated by players, as well as a sneak peak of Soulframe, a new title from the local game dev firm. The festivities kick off Friday and continue into Saturday at RBC Place London, with the second day streaming live on Twitch and YouTube.
The upshot: Warframe has been called “the most popular game you’ve never heard of” and is buoyed by legions of dedicated players around the world ― Digital Extremes claims to have more than 80 million players in its fanbase. “It’s not mainstream, even though it’s older and it’s outlived many games that have had way more buzz,” Digital Extremes creative director Rebecca Ford told CBC News London last year. “I think it’s due to our [aversion] to the spotlight that we continue to live in this little cohort of the gaming industry.” Expanded from a one- to two-day event this year, TennoCon 2024 is sold out and expected to draw its biggest crowd yet.
Read more: TennoCon
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Labatt shifts disaster relief production out of London to Halifax
Labatt is shifting its disaster relief production line out of its London brewery in order to focus more on conventional beverage production, the company announced last week. Labatt is moving the production of its canned water program, which it launched in 2012 and through which has donated more than a million cans of water over the years, to the Labatt-owned Oland Brewery in the north end of Halifax. Emergency water has been something that the London plant has periodically paused beer production to produce, but with greater demand for disaster relief expected, it is now investing around $120,000 in new water production out east. Labatt also said that the east coast is a better location for distribution, since the east coast is historically a frequent recipient of Labatt canned water.
The upshot: The move to shift production out east is also likely about freeing up more production capacity here in London. “Right now, our London brewery is at capacity,” said Labatt director of corporate affairs for Atlantic Canada, Wade Keller. Labatt’s London plant has been looking to increase production of conventional beverages, recently investing $26.6 million in brewing infrastructure (remember the four massive brew tanks winding their way through town last fall?), as well as launching more ready-to-drink beverage lines, like the SVNS Hard 7Up line.
Read more: CTV News London | The Coast Halifax
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Raising the roof: City looks to amend building height limits
There’s increasing appetite around the council table and among city staff to double down on building up, as the city aims to meet aggressive homebuilding targets over the coming years. City staff are recommending some steep increases to building height limits ― among them, upping the limit to 45 storeys in the downtown core (up from 35), 30 storeys in transit villages (up from 22), 25 storeys at sites within 150 metres of a transit station (up from 16) and 15 storeys along urban corridors (up from 10). As they considered these major long-term changes, council’s planning committee also unanimously endorsed some very tall housing projects this week. On Tuesday, they approved a proposal for two towers of 32 and 30 storeys at White Oaks, a 23-storey tower at Base Line and Wellington, and two more towers of 22 and 20 storeys at Richmond and Fanshawe Park Road.
The upshot: There is little debate among housing supply advocates and pro-housing city politicians for the need to build upwards (generally more cost-effective than building outwards) as the city grows. Most around the council table would ideally like to see this reflected in the height limits, which are a constant point of negotiation between the city and developers. It’s not unusual for the city to approve developments that exceed the limits stated in the 2016 London Plan ― indeed, all three of the projects approved this week technically exceed the current limits. The hope for some councillors is that increasing the limits will normalize the process somewhat. “There have been a number of past applications where we do these one-offs and change the heights,” said Councillor Anna Hopkins. Guidelines and predictability would help get these projects through without contentious planning fights. Deputy Mayor Shawn Lewis suggested that it would also bring city planning rules in line with what developers and city politicians want to build. “These new proposed heights make a lot of sense,” he said. “They’re pretty consistent with decisions that have been made in recent months.” The report will head to full city council for information, then public engagement will begin.
Read more: London Free Press
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Councillor pitches booze sales at more city facilities
Should you be able to order up a bevvy at more city facilities? Ward 2 councillor and Deputy Mayor Shawn Lewis believes the answer is yes and is asking city staff to look at raising more revenues through alcohol sales at city facilities such as rinks and sports fields. The city is already in the booze business, with sales at the Western Fair Sports Centre, Bud Gardens and elsewhere, he pointed out to CBC News London. “Is there a reason in this day and age why we couldn’t do it in more facilities?” he asks. “People are already consuming the alcohol, and I’d rather we sold it rather than have them tailgating in the parking lot. We can’t pretend it’s not already happening.” His ask also has the taxpayer in mind ― he presented the idea at a working group that is meant to come up with revenue generation opportunities for the city as it aims to keep future property tax hikes to a minimum.
The upshot: Lewis’ proposal will probably face a few hurdles. The first is health officials, who are customarily wary of expanding alcohol sales, and who point out that statistically, “the cost of alcohol outweighs the revenue of sales,” as the Middlesex London Health Unit’s Dr. Joanne Kearon put it in a letter to city staff. The second will be the estimated cost of retrofitting city facilities and training staff to sell controlled products. The other might be the customers: it’s still likely to be a lot cheaper to bring in your own cooler of drinks to the Tuesday night rec game, rather than shelling out $7 or more per drink, though the convenience factor might be worth it. Either way, Lewis figured, throw the idea out on the stoop to see if the cat laps it up. “Maybe there isn’t enough of an interest, or maybe there wouldn’t be enough revenue to offset the cost of inventory and staff training, but we should at least look at it,” he said. City staff will report back on the idea in the coming months.
Read more: CBC News London
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Dispatch: July 19, 2024
A summary of recent business appointments and announcements, plus event listings for the upcoming week.
View listings here
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