Merritt gets promoted at Canadian Country Music Awards

The Merritt Walk of Stars had excellent representation at the Canadian Country Music Awards in Calgary.
A team made up of Amber Papou, Ron Sanders, Peter Moyes and Muralist Michelle Loughery all attended the prestigious country event to promote what the program has been doing in Merritt.
Papou mentioned it was a whirlwind of a time that included being on their feet from 9 a.m. to 2 a.m. every day.
“Overall there were some fun moments but it was mostly a lot of work,” she said. “It was a blur, we talked to so many people.”
The group managed to hand out more than a large number of the Walk of Star’s information packages. The package included information on all of the Walk of Star’s initiatives including the muraling project, star walk and facades project. The package also showcases Merritt as the Country Music Capital of Canada. There is even a promotional DVD that features Harley Carman’s Merritt Song.
Sanders said people in the industry are starting to take notice of Merritt.
“They like Merritt,” he said. “The artists want to come back once they’ve been here.”
“All the people I talked to were very keen on the project,” added Papou. “We made so many contacts with industry people, some of them major players in the business.”
Sanders went on to say that, in regards to the Walk of Stars, the muraling project has added a lot. It’s all part of the groups attempt to reach bigger crowds and create awareness.
One main focus will now be reaching the bigger media and even CMT.
“We really need to do more work there,” said Sanders in regards to CMT. “We would like them to come up when an artist signs a mural.”
Of course, having the Merritt Mountain Music Festival win best festival at the awards certainly helped get the Merritt name in people’s minds.
“Everybody knows about MountainFest,” Sanders said. “It’s important for Merritt to get that exposure and in the end artists coming to town will make that happen.”
Sanders also had the chance to visit the nearby town of Cochrane which has it’s own façade program that was done by Urban Systems.
“It was working very well for them,” he said.
A sign that the Walk of Stars’ program is working was that nearly every artist at the CCMAs already has their very own star on the walk. Also early every artist at the CCMAs already had their own star already in Merritt.
Next for the Walk of Stars is the British Columbian Country Music Awards, in which they have been asked to take part. It will be another chance to promote their work in Merritt.