Last Wednesday, the Chamber held its Annual Membership Meeting and gave the 2024 Annual Report. To say that 2024 was challenging in many ways is an understatement, but thanks to the support of an outstanding board of directors, amazing volunteers, wonderful members and a fantastic community, we were able to finish strong.

The Chamber ended 2024 with a record-breaking 856 members and a 91% retention rate, which exceeds the national average of 78-86%. Here are a few more highlights of many for the year:

We held 10 Chamber Lunch programs on topics important to the business community. Some of last year’s programs included Sheridan County Travel & Tourism; Legislative Session Update; Young Professionals Panel; City, County & Municipalities Update; Health Insurance; Education; Building Authentic Connections; Good Things Are Luhming on the Horizon/LSC graduation; and Leading Through Crises.

We also held 22 Business After and Before Hours events at various member businesses.

Altogether the Chamber Lunch Program and Business Before and After Hours saw attendance of over 3,200 people connecting and strengthening their businesses. That breaks down to 270 people per month.

We coordinated the 29^th Annual Christmas Stroll, with 126 business participants and thousands coming out to support our local businesses.

For the 11^th year in a row, our Get Caught Shopping campaign was a huge success, with $3000 in Chamber bucks distributed during Stroll and over the next three Saturdays of the holiday season. And for the fourth year in a row, we sold out of all 3,270 buttons on Stroll Day. But the most important is that several businesses again reported record sales on Christmas Stroll day.

Advocating for local business is a top priority of the Chamber so when the Main Street Project continued into its second year, the Chamber again was heavily involved. We worked with WYDOT, the City, DSA, businesses and other partners to both gather and communicate important information and updates to the community.

We highlighted the importance of supporting Main Street businesses by partnering with the City to roll out year two of the “Get Your Paws on Some Chamber Bucks” campaign. First Federal Bank & Trust wanted to support the businesses as well and partnered with an additional donation so we could distribute a total of $7,800 in Chamber Bucks over the two-year period to encourage and thank folks for supporting local during the project.

The Chamber also provided 11 support and recommendation letters for businesses and organizations to help them obtain grant support for various projects as well as to lend our voice to issues affecting the business community.

As the community’s front door, the Chamber team wears many hats and has to remain knowledgeable pretty much about everything in our community. Throughout last year, we answered thousands of emails and responded to hundreds of referral and information requests, spoke with folks looking to relocate or visit, answering questions and connecting them with resources and our members.

In 2024, we distributed more than 350 relocation packets at no charge to those requesting them. These packets are mailed out to people all over the US looking at relocating, given to people who come in the office for information, as well as local realtors and company recruiters. Included in the relocation packets are the annual Community Guide & Member Directories produced in partnership with The Sheridan Press, and we distribute 9,000 of those annually. We also provided over 1,100 welcome bags to groups here for conferences and continued distributing the remainder of our 11,000 Community Maps. We are excited that the city will have updated city street and pathways maps for us to include in the new maps that will be published this year.

Last October we rolled out a new website, which features a more user-friendly design, easier to find information, better navigation and a focus on community and business growth.

Our website had nearly 200,000 visits, with the top three most visited pages being our online Membership Directory, with nearly 31,500 visits, our member job postings page with 35,000 views and the Community Calendar with 22,000 views. We partnered with Sheridan Media, Sheridan Press and Sheridan County Travel and Tourism for a joint community calendar this year to make things much smoother for the community. Now you can go to any of our websites to download your event and it will show on all partnering sites.

We have over 9,700 followers across our social media platforms, which is an 8% increase over last year. Our Live Life Local Facebook group that we launched in 2020 continues to grow with over 2,000 members, up almost 54% over last year.

We Distributed 84 total Chamber Online and Member 2 Member newsletters with an average open rate of 51% and click rate of 6%. That open rate is 9% higher than the industry average and click rate is 3% higher. That equates to over 78,000 opens and over 8,600 click throughs.

Last year, we celebrated excellence by recognizing 20 member businesses, organizations and individuals at our 25th Annual Awards of Excellence program. Recipients included Megan Cook of Java Moon for Businessperson of the Year, AlphaGraphics for Business of the Year, Cody Sinclair for Community Champion Award and First Federal Bank & Trust for Strength of Sheridan Award.
Chamber Bucks continue to become more popular, as they help keep dollars here in Sheridan County and help to support our local businesses. This past year we saw an 8% increase in sales and ended the year with $229,325 in Chamber Bucks sold.

The impact your chamber has is the result of a dedicated staff, board of directors and our five standing volunteer committees.

Business Retention & Expansion Committee: Led by Chair: Ty Malone; Vice Chair: Ron Lee; Secretary: Nadine Gale
Coordinated the 9^th Ignite Conference with 20 sessions over a broad array of topics as well as two bonus sessions with keynote speakers. We also saw our highest attendance of 190 in 2024. The day-long professional development conference provided opportunities to learn and grow in areas such as business development, HR, finance, marketing and leadership. This year we added an executive track for business owners and executive managers, which was very well received.
Each year, the BRE Committee celebrates National Manufacturing Day, and this year they decided to make it Manufacturing Month and held tours for the entire month of October. This allowed more flexibility for the manufacturers on scheduling, business community with being able to attend as well as the school districts. We were able to have 200 students alone this year participate, which was excellent. Our celebration continues to be held as a model for the state.

Ag & Natural Resources Committee: Led by Chair: Khale Century Reno; Vice Chair: Marlin Norling; Secretary: Carrie Rogaczewski
Partnered with Sheridan County Cattlewomen, 4-H, and Fair Association to host the Buyers’ Dinner prior to the Youth Livestock Sale.
Held 4 Lunchtime Conversations About Open Spaces with a total of 120 people in attendance.

Leadership Sheridan County Steering Committee: Led by Chair: Alison Meacham; Vice Chair: Amber Shirley; Secretary: Heather Doke
Met throughout the year to oversee and support the 10-month LSC program.
Celebrated the graduation of 21 local leaders who completed last year’s program, resulting in 435 LSC alumni since 1993.

Government Affairs Committee: Led by Chair: Cody Sinclair; Vice Chair: David Schwend; Secretary: Gail Symons
Held pre and post legislative-session events, which offered the public the opportunity to hear from and connect with our legislative delegation.
They coordinated the annual Legislative Forum for businesses, organizations and individuals to bring topics of interest before the delegation prior to them heading into session. This full day forum had 23 presenters and five of the six members of the local delegation in attendance.
Hosted Candidate Forums for the primary and general elections. The primary candidate forum was recorded, and the general election forums were livestreamed and recorded. In total, there were 1859 views of the forums.

Ambassadors Committee: Led by Chair: Katie Culver; Vice Chair: Jack Wood; Secretary: Christine Dieterich
Coordinated the Boot Kick Off with the WYO Rodeo at Whitney Commons Park.
Assisted with 191 total events, including 88 ribbon cuttings, Get Your Paws on Some Chamber Bucks Campaign, Christmas Stroll and Get Caught Shopping as well as community events such as the Home Show, RMLTS, and the Federal Funding Summit hosted by Senators Barrasso and Lummis.

As a catalyst for business prosperity and a champion for a stronger community, the Chamber strengthens the local economy. Our Chamber’s efforts are a critical part of what makes Sheridan a desirable place to live, work and play. We will continue working on behalf of our members to continue building a strong business community and look forward to great success in 2025.