The City of Moose Jaw won the Saskatchewan Economic Development Alliance’s (SEDA) Marketing Award during the SEDA Provincial Summit held June 11 to 13, taking home the honour for the original and eye-catching ‘Get A Life by moving to Moose Jaw’ campaign. 

The SEDA Marketing Award for a population over 5,000 people is sponsored by Tourism Saskatchewan. 

The ‘Get A Life’ campaign launched in the summer of 2022 to encourage people to move to Moose Jaw, touting benefits such as the comparatively low cost of housing, short commutes, family-friendly community, employment opportunities. 

“It’s always nice to be recognized,” said Craig Hemingway, the city’s acting director of strategic growth. Hemingway spearheaded the campaign as a member of Moose Jaw’s economic development team at the time. Hemingway said the campaign resulted from a request from city council as the world reacted to remote work changes after COVID. 

“We appreciate that people looked at our campaign and appreciated the work that went into it and thought it was worthy of giving an award to. We’re humbled by that, you know, there’s a lot of communities across our province, everybody’s trying to do what they can to attract people and set themselves apart, and we’re just really honoured to be chosen.” 

‘Get A Life’ previously won national attention with three ‘Marketing Canada’ awards in October 2023 at the Economic Developers Association of Canada conference in PEI, where Moose Jaw has also won awards for the ‘Canada’s Most Notorious City’ branding and for the famous ‘Moose War’ with Norway. 

“It was overwhelmingly positive at the (SEDA Provincial Summit),” Hemingway added. “Anywhere we go outside of Moose Jaw, we always hear some variation of ‘Oh, I love Moose Jaw!’ 

“Some people were very complimentary of the campaign. They thought it was creative and bold, and some of the little flourishes like the ‘Get A Life’ cereal boxes, they thought were just a neat touch.” 

The campaign includes video testimonials from Moose Javians and promotional Get A Life cereal boxes containing all of Moose Jaw’s “Notoriously Nutritious” ingredients that add up to a superior quality of life when compared to other cities.  

Learn about previous SEDA award winners on the SEDA website. For more information on the City’s Get A Life campaign, visit www.MooseJaw.ca/GetALife.