Find your tribe

If your job or profession allows you to work from pretty much anywhere, you won’t be alone – we have a growing community of locally based telecommuters, freelancers and home-based business owners who offer their products and services over the internet. We have a number of providers for internet services, including one or two that can work with rural properties or on surrounding islands. Because we spend so much time at home, we’re pretty excited to get out for a hike or coffee meetup.

Click here to talk with an entrepreneur on the Coast

Our business community on the Sunshine Coast is very active and has great support networks to help new businesses get started and existing businesses to grow. It’s a good time to start a business here – the population of the Coast is expected to grow to approximately 30,390 by 2020* and there are still many products and services that aren’t available here. Will you be the one to bring them here?

*Stats from Stats BC Provincial Projections

Click here to talk with a business owner on the Coast

The Sunshine Coast is a great place to raise a family. The woods and beaches are amazing playgrounds. We have a bunch of great sports, recreation, and arts organizations led by some amazingly creative people in our community that help kids explore and develop their talents. There are some options for schools and daycare – so making connections ahead of your arrival is a good strategy. The coast seems to be connecting with lots of new families coming here to have a connected but yet simpler life within easy reach of Vancouver.

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If you love to play outside, you will find lots of places to adventure on the Sunshine Coast. No matter where you live, you’re minutes from sports fields, beautiful beaches, golf courses, forested hiking trails, ocean kayaking and sailing, and mountain biking trails built by the local riding community to world class standards. On weekends you will find locals riding at the extremely popular Coast Gravity Park, hiking with their dogs on the trails at Cliff Gilker or Big Tree parks, skiing and snowshoeing on Dakota Ridge, jumping off the dock on Davis Bay, or kayaking up Sechelt Inlet.

Click here to talk with an outdoor enthusiast on the Coast

The Sunshine Coast is home to the largest per capita population of artists, artisans, and crafters in the country. Last year’s Sunshine Coast Art Crawl had more than 149 participating venues. If you’re an artist craving the company of other creative souls, to advance your work or art practice – or if you’re an art lover who enjoys visiting studios marvelling at fabulously creative work – you’ll find what you’re looking for here.

Click here to talk with an artist on the Coast

We have a thriving writers’ community as well as a number of small publishing houses here on the Sunshine Coast, and one of our nation’s most beloved writers festival featuring only Canadian authors and voices. It’s rare to go to a party and not run into at least one person who makes his or her living with a pen. There must be something about the rainforest and the rugged coastline that stimulates the writerly imagination… or maybe it’s just the delicious locally roasted coffee.

Click here to talk with a writer on the Coast

The Sunshine Coast is one of the most queer-friendly rural communities in British Columbia. The GLBTQ2 residents number in the hundreds.  People from the community often get together for potlucks, meet-ups, games nights and dances. There are many GLBT-owned and/or gay-friendly businesses on the Coast.  The Sunshine Coast Gay & Lesbian Association (SCGALA, mixed) and Sappho’s Circle (women) are points of contact, along with Sunshine Coast Pride, a volunteer-led committee. A not-for-profit society was recently formed for ‘Sunday in the Park with Pride’, an organization with a mission to support queer youth on the Sunshine Coast. The society runs the annual Sunday in the Park with Pride event at Mission Point each June, including the new (2nd year) Pride Parade from the Davis Bay Pier to Mission Point Park, and hosts two meetings per month – one closed for transgender/other-gendered folks to gather, and the other an open meeting for any GLBTQ2 people of any age. This organization also publishes the Annual Sunshine Coast Pride Guide, a print magazine available at coffee shops, doctors offices and retail locations around the coast for free. For more information, please visit prideguide.ca

Click here to talk with a GLBT person on the Coast

We have a lot of incredible musicians and performers on the Sunshine Coast. If you’re looking for entertainment, you’ll find it – maybe not as easily as the city, but it’s out there. For starters, catch a show at the Heritage Playhouse or check out the great bands that play the renowned Roberts Creek Hall. Every summer there are festivals almost every weekend which give our city friends an excuse to dig out their birkenstocks and camp chairs for a coast style vacation. And of course, some of the most legendary jam sessions take place around the bonfire or in your own home.

Click here to talk with a musician or performer on the Coast