A popular Calgary-based obstacle course and activity centre has announced it will be closing due to challenges related to the COVID-19 pandemic.
InjaNation made the announcement of its permanent closure Wednesday in a statement on its website.
“The pandemic understandably made the public reluctant to venture out to participate in many activities and venues that they used to,” the statement read.
“As we see no end in sight to this pandemic, we have made the decision to permanently close our doors on Aug. 30.
“We want to thank you for supporting InjaNation for the last four years. We grew from an idea into a well-established brand where thousands of children, young adults and families have come to have fun, exercise, develop skills and confidence.”
The centre opened in 2016 and employed just under 90 people.
It had temporarily closed amid heavy COVID-19 restrictions in March, but then reopened in June for summer camps that used the cohort method to keep groups small.
“We’ve increased cleaning protocols and we’ve reduced capacity but we do understand that there is a hesitancy to venture out into the establishments such as ours,” said Leslie Newell, InjaNation’s marketing and communications manager.
“As a small business, we tried to innovate and offer other programs such as the cohort camp — that people were aware of last week — however interest and that ability to commit just wasn’t there,” Newell said.
The centre said it would be refunding birthday party deposits, but gift certificates must be used before its closure on Aug. 30.
“We would like to encourage all Calgarians to support locally owned businesses as much as possible during these difficult times,” InjaNation said.
This is the second large Calgary entertainment centre that has closed due to the COVID-19 pandemic — Shakers Fun Centre also closed permanently after its initial shutdown in March.
“It’s a huge blow,” said Ellen Percival with Calgary’s Child Magazine. “We do feel very, very bad for them.”
She worries that other similar facilities will soon be forced to close as well.
“In March, April and May, we saw class and camp providers change their models. They started offering online.. They started offering smaller cohort groups,” Percival said.
“It’s a terrible shame to have lost Inja… we need places like this. We need kids to be able to blow off steam and look forward to something again.”
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