dodsys

Today in every paper in Toronto the Maple Leafs were on the front page. This is no surprise as Toronto is the biggest hockey market in the world. What the surprise was the possibility of Rogers Communications proposing to purchase the Maple Leaf Entertainment company. What this includes is the Toronto Raptors, Toronto Maple Leafs, Marliees, and Toronto fcs. In other words, Rogers would own every sports team besides the Argonauts in Toronto as they already own the Toronto Blue Jays. The deal is rumored to be valued at 1.3 billion dollars which would make it the biggest deal in Canadian history.

My question is, where is Rogers getting all this money….are we not just coming out of a recession. In the summer Rogers Communications bought the rights to basically anything regarding the Vancouver Canucks in a deal that was rumored in the hundreds of millions. Now this comes out today! I do realize that they are Canada’s largest communication company but maybe they could create better student specials instead of buying large franchises!

Today I was really craving a booster juice from the campus location in the village. To my shock on arrival, there were several rcmp cars outside the village.  What was even more shocking was the fact that all the policemen were located inside booster juice itself. Booster Juice isn’t really a target for crime what so ever. The only real liability is that its located beside the liquor store which usually has many thefts and criminal incidents. I just find it ironic in this day and age people are forced to steal from a convenience health food store. On top of this, the fact that it was in broad daylight so anyone could have done something about it but no one did. It is amazing how incidents like this happen daily in highly urban areas where people don’t even notice or care.

When many think of the Edmonton Oilers they think of the greats like Gretzky, Messier, and Fuhr. Many may also think of the new upcoming stars like Eberle and Hall. This however, has been pushed under the table recently with a giant debate between Oilers owner Daryl Katz and the City of Edmonton. Daryl Katz, who is a billionaire businessman bought the Oilers in 2008 and has been in the process of bringing the Oilers back to their legendary form. His main stance right now is that the Oilers need a venue change. In July of this year Katz proposed a new arena that would be in the downtown core as opposed to in Northlands (a recreation centre in North Edmonton). He called it a ” downtown vitalization” project which would consist of dozens of new shops and restaurants centered around a new arena for the Oilers. Rexall Place where the Oilers play in Northlands is outdated and one of the oldest buildings in the NHL. The problem is that the City doesn’t understand why Katz can’t build this arena privately.  Katz wants the City to contribute investment towards the project yet in the long run the Katz group would gain all revenue. On top of this, if the Oilers move from Rexall Place then what will happen to Northlands. Currently, Rexall Place is Northlands main contributor for revenue. If the Oilers leave the city worries that it may be the end of Northlands. None the less, Katz is firm on his stance that the Oilers will not play in Rexall Place once their lease expires in 2014. Someone has to budge fast or Edmonton could lose their main sports attraction and this could lead to a very poor economy.

In the Province newspaper today, Sun Life financial reported that it has finally returned to making a profit in its most recent quarter. This is huge as you compare this to last years numbers where the majority of insurance companies experienced extreme loses. Many associate this with the recession that began in 2008 and had large repercussions which carried over into 2009.

This means that everything is back to normal right? Wrong! The United States continues to stimulate the economy to our south which in the long run has been driving down interest rates in the following months. This creates no revenues for most financial aid companies. Many speculate that the only way the United States economy survives is if it is at war. This is ironic because just last week there was an attempted terrorist attack on a flight going to Chicago from Yemen. This now gives the US an excuse to attack Yemen creating a potential for war. Hmmmmm……trying to stimulate the economy? Who knows as this is always a theory that the US creates these fake terrorist attacks on themselves to start a war. Only time will tell how the economy to our south will fair in the upcoming months.

I was recently introduced to a company called Pacific Western Brewing which is ironic because what they are doing with their company is what was being talked about Tuesday in class. In class we used Virgin as an example of a company that has many different product lines that touch different markets ( ie. Virgin soft drinks and Virgin Mobile). Pacific Western Brewing is typically known for their value line of beers which includes: Cariboo, Dude, Pacific Pilsner, and Canterbury. All of these are consistently the cheapest beers in the liquor store and get purchased very frequently because of the quality beer for an extremely low price. This works to a certain degree as many consumers are brand name consumers and go for what they see on television or in the media. Pacific Western Brewing isn’t as big as Molson or Labatt so they don’t have teh advertising budget to promote their lines in all main channels of the media. What they have done I find quite fascinating…

Pacific Western Brewing just recently launched a line of both organic energy drinks and organic beer. They believe that is is where the world is going and they want to promote being an eco-friendly company. They have received a great deal of  success so far as they have gotten the organic beer into all liquor stores in BC and Alberta with good success in their first few months. The energy drink market is obviously a tough market as there are so many competitors who are globally known. I believe that Pacific Western has done quite well as they have gotten there drink into most local groceries stores and are now the proud sponsor of the Whitecaps soccer team. I find it quite fascinating as either a repositioning or a new positioning in the market could lead to success within a different market niche.

As many hockey fans know over the summer GM Place was changed to Rogers Arena. This is because Rogers Communications essentially found every single way to put their name associated with the Canucks. Being a Telus user I have always been known to show favoritism to Telus so when I heard that GM Place would now be called Rogers Arena I was rather annoyed.  If you know me I get over  things pretty fast so after a week or two passed by I really didn’t care too much about the name change.

On Saturday, I went to a Canucks preseason game and my anger came back with regards to Rogers. Stepping into GM Place ( I refuse to call it Rogers Arena ) I was in shock how shameless Rogers is in trying to market any form of their products. Rogers stands are strategically placed around the arena trying to pitch their cell phone services and cable options. The rogers logo is on the boards of the rink five times! This is ridiculous as many companies struggle to get on the boards for a single game let alone have five permanent locations. To top that, Rogers did a horrible job at removing any signs or advertisements that said GM Place. In one case there just a big black strip of what looks like electrical tape over a GM logo on the jumbo-tron . I feel that if a company just wants to throw money at something for marketing that they should at least do a tasteful job in doing so.  Even the starting lineups and three stars were “powered by rogers” which is  something I didn’t even think could get sponsored. Something needs to change fast or next thing you know many canucks fans will start getting rogers tattoos!

Maslow’s pyramid in class totally woke me up with all the colors and randomness…….apparently sex come before your own health and the safety of ur family :S lol

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Hey my name is Kyle and this is my blog ya’ll………Just wanna give a big shout out to the Vancouver Canucks. There are tons of ads and promotions around for their 40th anniversary which is very exciting to see. Looking forward to a great season and to see who gets the new captaincy.

p.s. Dodsy is what most people call me