Update: This event has been postponed due concerns about COVID-19. More detail is available here.
Former U.S. first lady Michelle Obama will land in Victoria next month as part of the tour for her best-selling memoir, Becoming.
Obama will headline an event at the Save-on-Foods Memorial Centre on March 31 called A Conversation with Michelle Obama. Tickets go on sale Wednesday, Feb. 26, at 10 a.m.
The event is sponsored by the Greater Victoria Chamber of Commerce, which has spent the better part of a year working out the details for the visit.
The organization was helped in its pursuit by the Greater Vancouver Board of Trade, which brought Obama’s husband, former U.S. president Barack Obama, to the Vancouver Convention Centre last year.
“We expressed our strong interest, and then crossed our fingers, and then we got the news she was willing to come,” said Catherine Holt, CEO of the Greater Victoria Chamber of Commerce.
“It’s fabulous that we’ve been able, on behalf of our magnificent little city, to attract somebody who is so highly thought-of and so popular.”
There is no word yet on who will join Obama on stage in Victoria. Oprah Winfrey, Sarah Jessica Parker and Reese Witherspoon have been moderators for past dates.
The Save-on-Foods Memorial Centre has 6,500 seats, making it among the smallest venues on the Becoming tour, and demand for tickets is expected to be high.
The first dates on the tour, which began in 2018, were large-scale events in venues with 20,000-seat capacities, with ticket prices as high as US $3,000.
But accommodations are made at each appearance for groups and organizations aimed at young women, and tickets in Victoria range from $99 to $299.
“I wanted a lot of young people to come, not just a handful,” Obama, who has degrees from Princeton University and Harvard law school, told The New York Times in 2018. “I wanted thousands of girls around the country to have this opportunity. So, I’ve given away 10 per cent of every venue. And 10 per cent of a lot of seats is a lot.”
With no other Canadian dates currently on Obama’s itinerary — she is scheduled to appear April 1 in Sacramento, California — the Victoria engagement is expected to draw fans from Vancouver and Seattle.
“It makes people see us a little bit differently,” Holt said of hosting a speaker with so much star power. “It’s also good for our local business. There’s going to be a lot of people staying in hotels and eating at restaurants and flying here and taking the ferry and everything else.”
Tickets for A Conversation with Michelle Obama go on sale at 10 a.m. on Wednesday, Feb. 26, from selectyourtickets.com, by phone at 250-220-7777, or through the Save-on-Foods Memorial box office (1925 Blanshard St.).
