KB Coffee House and Culture Days Opening Ceremony

2022 Culture Days by The Pas Arts Council

Organized by

The Pas Arts Council/Gloria Ballantyne-Packo

The Pas Arts Council exists to promote arts and culture in The Pas through exposure, education and participation. Arts and cultural groups are members of The Pas Arts Council and conduct programming specific to their mandates. One of the roles of the arts council is to provide support to the member groups including advertising, financial grants and with applying for larger grants. In addition, the arts council provides programming that is not provided by member groups as resources are available. About KB Coffe: KB Coffee is a dream I had that could blend two of the things I am most passionate about. 1. Specialty coffee but, more importantly, 2. Advocating for MMIWG. In 2019, my little sister Kendara Ballantyne was missing and later found dead. She was/is one of the people I love most in this life and the loss was devastating. It took me awhile to find myself again but I did it with the help of my family. Family is the most valuable thing to me and I knew that I wanted to honour Kendara in my own special way. KB Coffee first started as a coffeehouse that was held this past year during the Northern Manitoba Trappers' Festival as a way to bring awareness to Kendara’s case and honour her memory. Then I started to set up at a couple smaller events. As I continued, the urging from family and customers to start a coffee shop began. But, I want it to be more than just a place to get great coffee. I want to enrich the community as an Indigenous woman and continue creating awareness of MMIWG. As of now, I am starting small with pop up shops every now and then and will work towards upgrading to a mobile shop and, one day, a physical Café! I have so many hopes for the future of KB Coffee and I’m thankful to everyone that is starting this journey with me… this is just the beginning!