Heavy lifting for Calgary’s Blue Sky City rebranding has only begun

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As Calgary swaps its cowboy and energy imagery for a reference to its sunny skies, a marketing expert says the city’s new slogan will require a monumental effort to get it to stick — but early signals show it could be a success.

A new tagline for Calgary, dubbed the Blue Sky City, was unveiled Wednesday by Calgary Economic Development, Calgary Tourism and a slew of city organizations in tech, the arts and culture.

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In doing so, the city will ditch its current slogan, Be Part of the Energy, which was introduced in the early 2010s.

“The fact that they got to the race and they got the bib on and are running is huge — but that doesn’t get (them) to the finish line,” said David Finch, a marketing professor at Mount Royal University who’s held several executive marketing positions at companies including Rogers and Bell.

“If it’s just one person running it, you’re dead.”

The announcement comes after several years of “extensive” research and focus groups, said Cindy Ady, CEO of Tourism Calgary. A logo will come in due time, said Brad Parry, president and CEO of Calgary Economic Development.

“This is not meant to be a ‘flip-the-switch and everything changes,’” Parry said.

A direct nod to Calgary’s perhaps lesser-known reputation as the sunniest city in Canada, the Blue Sky City slogan was crafted as a symbol of “unexpected possibilities, where ambitions are as big as the blue skies we converge under,” Parry said. It serves as a catch-all, he said, for the city’s diversity and expanding mix of economic sectors.

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Parry said the slogan isn’t a deliberate shift away from Calgary’s long-standing reputation as a city dominated by the energy industry and Calgary Stampede. “I think if anything, it embraces our heritage,” he said.

Partners needed to help slogan succeed: expert

While the heavy lifting has only begun, the initial slogan “has some legs,” Finch said.

“You can start owning a lot when you’re starting to lean into something like the Blue Sky City. I could see how blue — which would contradict and challenge the official red of the city — could be used very effectively,” he said.

But that will all be for naught if CED and the city don’t get buy-in from companies and groups like Calgary Sports and Entertainment Corp. (CSEC) who can advocate for the brand and help it become part of the city’s identity.

“You need partners like (CSEC) and others who are prepared to lean in and start owning the Blue Sky City as part of their brand, because they see it as they are contributing,” he said. “The essence of the Blue Sky City is the Calgary Flames, the Stampeders, Theatre Calgary and Suncor.”

Calgary seeking to improve reputation

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The switch comes after two studies found Calgary’s reputation is relatively poor among Canadians who live outside Alberta.

One of those, authored and published in June 2022 by Finch and two researchers for the Canada West Foundation, found 44 per cent of respondents from Vancouver and Toronto said they’d never move to Calgary. Just 33 per cent of those respondents also viewed Alberta as having a diverse population despite Calgary being the third-most diverse city in Canada.

Meanwhile, a 2021 poll from Maru Public Opinion found half of Canadians wouldn’t feel comfortable living in Alberta. It also found there’s a perception that life in the province runs counter to the common goals of Canadians. On the heels of that report, Calgary Chamber of Commerce CEO and President Deborah Yedlin called for the city to rebrand and change its reputation.

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The move is Calgary’s third slogan swap in less than a quarter-century.

Calgary’s current tagline found on welcome signs on the edge of the city currently read “Be Part of the Energy,” a slogan that was adopted in 2011 to attract business and workers. “Heart of the New West” preceded that tagline for 15 years, which was adopted at the turn of the millennium.

‘No experience is shared more broadly than our beautiful blue sky’

Several key players have already endorsed the new slogan: Joel Cowley, CEO of Calgary Stampede, who was among the group of city leaders at Wednesday’s announcement said it’s a fitting tagline because the Stampede most often happens “under Calgary’s blue sky.”

“When you stop and think about it, there is no experience that is shared more broadly than our beautiful blue sky,” Cowley said.

If the city fails to bring partners and the private sector on board, Finch said, it could go the way of Alberta’s ill-fated $25 million “Freedom to create, Spirit to achieve” campaign which was cooked up in 2009 under former premier Ed Stelmach and sent to the dustbin two years later by then-premier Alison Redford.

Leaders from the Calgary Chamber of Commerce, Arts Commons, the Centre for Newcomers, Calgary Hotel Association, Platform Calgary, Ask Auntie Consulting, Calgary Arts Development and Calgary Immigrant Women’s Association were all in attendance at Wednesday’s announcement.

Parry said the next pieces of the rebranding will be an “organic process” that’s unveiled over the coming months.

mscace@postmedia.com
X: @mattscace67

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