When people talk about Canada standing up to American tariffs, they usually picture a steelworker in Hamilton, an autoworker in Windsor or a sawmill in northern B.C. Those workers have taken the hardest hits, and they deserve every bit of support this country can give them.

But “elbows up” was never meant to belong to a handful of industries. It’s something ordinary Canadians decided to do together: at the grocery store, at the liquor store and in where they spend their evenings and weekends. The businesses that serve them are part of the fight too.

I run a bowling alley. Three of them, in fact, in downtown Toronto. That may not sound like the front line of a trade war. It’s closer than you’d think.

I opened The Ballroom Bowl on John Street in December 2010. Downtown Toronto had no bowling at all, and the economy was still shaking off the financial crisis. I was a financial advisor, not a bowling centre operator, and more than a few people told me I was crazy. But I believed then, as I do now, that people want to be in a room together. They want to laugh, compete a little, eat well and put their phones down for an hour.

That bet has paid off. We opened in Yorkville in 2023 and at Yonge-Dundas in early 2025, bringing duckpin bowling to one of the busiest corners in the country. We planned and built both locations through the uncertainty of the pandemic. Today we employ over 200 people across the three sites. Every one of those jobs is in Toronto, and every dollar we earn stays in this country.

When Canadians put their elbows up, many of them chose to stay home. They skipped the weekend in Buffalo or the trip to Vegas and spent that money here instead. “Locally owned and operated” used to be a line on our website. Now it’s a reason people walk through the door.

That comes with responsibility. If we ask customers to choose us because we’re Canadian, we should make the same choice ourselves. Over the past year, we’ve moved 40 of our draft lines to Canadian brewers — representing roughly 750 hectolitres of Canadian beer annually — and replaced American spirits and wines with Canadian alternatives. Multiply those choices across thousands of restaurants, bars and entertainment venues, and they create real demand for Canadian farmers, brewers, winemakers and distillers.

Main Street businesses are feeling the trade fight in other ways too. We are paying more for food, beverages and equipment, while economic uncertainty affects tourism and discretionary spending. Tourism and hospitality aren’t usually counted among the “tariff-impacted sectors.” They should be. The trade fight has hit us just as surely, only through higher costs and empty seats instead of lost export orders.

Ottawa recently expanded its Regional Tariff Response Initiative and opened it to businesses in all tariff-impacted sectors. That’s welcome. But being eligible on paper isn’t the same as getting help in practice. Businesses like mine should be able to qualify by showing indirect impacts: higher input costs, disrupted supply chains and fewer visitors and customers.

As Ottawa heads into budget season, it has a chance to make sure Canada’s response reaches beyond the sectors dominating the headlines. That should include restoring growth funding for tourism, hospitality and entertainment businesses ready to expand. And that support should go first to companies that are Canadian-controlled and committed to Canadian jobs, Canadian suppliers and reinvesting here.

I have an obvious interest in this: I want businesses like mine to grow. But that is exactly the point. Foreign investors—including Americans—already recognize the value of successful Canadian hospitality and entertainment companies. If Canadians are serious about keeping ownership, jobs and profits here, we need to invest in our own businesses before someone else does.

In August, we packed our John Street location for a screening of The Tragically Hip’s A National Celebration, ten years after that final show in Kingston. A room full of strangers sang along to every song. Nobody had to tell them what it meant to be Canadian that night.

That’s what elbows up looks like to me. It isn’t anger. It’s pride, and a decision about where your money and your Friday nights go.

Whether you run a factory, a farm or a bowling alley, elbows up means doing your part.

Paul Donato is the founder and president of The Ballroom Bowl, a Canadian owned bowling and entertainment company with three locations in downtown Toronto.

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