INNISFAIL – Doug Bos and wife Debbie Rowland, co-owners of Innisfail’s 90-acre Discovery Wildlife Park, are finally enjoying the pleasures of a real home.
The couple moved out of their 160 square-foot living space in the main building last spring after more than 20 years and into a new 2,400 square foot duplex in the northwest corner of the park.
Their daughter Serena Bos, the park’s zookeeper, is now living on the other side of the duplex.
It was 14 months ago when the couple’s development permit application to build the duplex was approved by Innisfail town council.
The new duplex was completed in early spring of this year and the family moved in on April 10.
In the meantime, Doug and Rowland were left with extra vacant space inside the main building.
When the zoo’s season was closed to the public on Sept. 30 the couple moved ahead to convert their once cherished, albeit spartan, living space into something more financially viable.
“Instead of just having a room there, we just tore the walls out and expanded the gift shop because we didn't need that room anymore,” said Doug, adding the new space is not only beneficial to the zoo’s bottom line but for guests as well.
“It provided more room for them (guests) to get around all the gift shop items,” he added. “It also allowed us to display more products rather than having them in a designated storage room and have to keep putting them out.”
And the timing of the public opening of the extra retail space, with its wide selection of new zoo souvenirs, was perfect.
The first night of the expanded main building retail space was on Nov. 15, the opening night of the zoo’s 3rd Annual Light the Night attraction that is expected to draw up to 28,000 local and out of town guests by event closing day on Jan. 5.
“It’s been good,” said Doug of the early response. “It's only been open for a few days. So, we'll see how it turns out for Light the Night, and then come next season when we open the zoo up we'll see, but it should really help a lot.”
