Twenty Two Media is using the strength of its marquee publication, Foodism, to expand into events and give its advertisers more opportunities to reach its audience.

Foodism 40 is designed to identify and recognize the top 40 change makers and innovators who are making a positive impact on the
Toronto and Ontario food, beverage and travel industries. The event will also mark the celebration of Foodism’s 40th issue since it launched in Canada eight years ago.

The event will have 200 invite-only guests at a downtown Toronto venue in mid October. Attendees will include the 40 nominees and their guests, VIPs, industry leaders and Foodism readers. The publisher will conduct a reader contest to select attendees.

Twenty Two Media is offering three tiers of event sponsorship: title, gold and activation. In addition to sampling and demonstration opportunities on-site, each sponsorship comes with a Foodism media package and opportunities to be part of the pre- and post-promotion of the event.

Foodism distributes 50,000 issues to a readership of 200,000 five times per year, in addition to 100,000 unique monthly visitors to its website and 27,000 subscribers to its weekly email newsletter.

Events are part of a strategy at Twenty Two Media to diversify the revenue streams at Foodism and sister travel publication Escapism. The plan on the event from is to extend Foodism’s strong alignment with food, beverage and travel into events that give advertisers an opportunity beyond its publications to reach a well-targeted audience of local industry changemakers and Foodism readers. It is also a return to plans the company had begun prior to the COVID-19 pandemic.

“We are looking for Foodism 40 to be an annual event, recognizing the people from the industry who are doing great things each year,” says Lynn Chambers, managing director at Twenty Two Media. “We were running a robust event program prior to COVID, so we are planning on adding more events in the future to get back to our pre-COVID business practices, including marquee Foodism events along with bespoke client events built around their goals.”

Twenty Two Media has also been expanding its creative services division, which has recently brought on a handful of new clients.