The Question and Answer feature helps readers learn more about prominent people in the business community. This issue’s Q&A profiles Anita Wetsch, director of sales at Canfield Business Interiors and an eight-year member of the City Planning Commission.
 Anita Wetsch of Canfield Business Interiors (Inertia/for the SFBJ)
Name: Anita Wetsch
Title: Director of sales, Canfield Business Interiors
Background: Graduate of Northern State University with a double major in business management and marketing; started working at Canfield in 1988; 1997 Young Women of Excellence award winner; 1998 graduate, Leadership Sioux Falls; past diplomat with Sioux Falls Area Chamber of Commerce; first vice president, Sales and Marketing Executives of Sioux Falls; City Planning Commission member for eight years
Hometown: Barnard
Age: 41
Family: Husband, Larry; daughter, Molly, 4; and son, Max, 2
Q: Tell me about your hobbies.
A: “Before kids? Reading, gourmet cooking, music.”
Q: How did you become interested in your field?
A: “I met Larry Canfield, our company founder, right out of college and quickly realized that the business he had created in the field of commercial interior design and creating great spaces for people to work in, truly, what could be more fun.”
Q: What do you enjoy most about work?
A: “Our customers and how they feel when our team has improved their work environment. We truly can impact an organization in a very direct way by creating a quality work environment for their staff.”
Q: What’s the biggest challenge facing the city from a development standpoint?
A: “Whenever you grow as quickly as we have, you face many issues that come from that speed of growth. Staying ahead of it so that the land use reflects what we need as a community but being open to new approaches as necessary to accommodate the growth.”
Q: What skills or perspectives do you bring to the Planning Commission?
A: “I love this community. Thru my travels I have learned that we have something very special here, with our river system, our parks and greenway space, our downtown and just the attitude from the community to continue to make this a great place to live. I think I am a proponent for economic development, while trying to have an eye to the details to make sure we are covering all the issues not only for today but 50 years from now. I think we as a community struggle to understand just where this city is heading in terms of its long-term growth. Our city is changing.”
Q: What sparked your commitment to public service?
A: “Larry Canfield preached public service to me from the minute he hired me. Also my family was always very involved in things that benefited others, through church and community. So I had great mentors in that area.”
Q: How do you find time to balance your job and your family?
A: “I have a great husband who supports my need to try to do it all. We just focus in on the task at hand and try to have fun along the way. My husband owns his own business, so we keep things hopping. We either divide and conquer, or our kids love one-on-one time with either my husband or I if the other has a meeting, so it works.”
Q: What’s your favorite charity?
A: “We are Heart Club members for the Sioux Empire United Way. I feel like I can help a number of worthy causes through that effort.”
Q: What’s your favorite getaway?
A: “My husband and I went to Portugal when our daughter was 8 months old. It was a beautiful country with friendly people, great food and still somewhat untouched, unlike other parts of Europe.”
Q: If you could take a one-year sabbatical, what would you do?
A: “Take my husband and kids and travel the world. We are adventurers.”
Q: What kind of music is in your car?
A: “Car time is my thinking time, so if the kids aren’t with me, I enjoy the peace or I am listening to a book on tape. I just started listening to ‘Mere Christianity’ (by C.S. Lewis).”
Q: If you could have dinner with two or three people, alive or dead, who would you choose and why?
A: “My maternal grandparents who have both passed on because I could use their wisdom in a few areas. Also my husband’s late father, whom I have never met.”
Q: What do you think are the best and worst things about living in Sioux Falls?
A: “Less cold, and we need a good Thai restaurant. I love the city and the forward thinking of the business community.”
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