The Toronto Argonauts are set to unveil a marketing plan that Toronto has not experienced since the move to Skydome, now Rogers Center, two decades ago. As per the Winnipeg Sun’s Kirk Penton, “The new message will hit the 6ix next week, and there will be Argos everywhere you look and listen: TV, radio, patios, subway stations, billboards. You name it, and it’ll have an Argos ad on it. The franchise hired the Bensimon Byrne marketing company to tackle the project.”
Here is a link to the full article from the Sun: http://www.torontosun.com/2016/05/16/argonauts-set-to-unveil-new-branding
Argos Re-Branding for 2016 Will Help Attendance and Relevance
So what will this all mean for the double blue? A new stadium (BMO Field); new ownership and management looking to pull out all the stops to bring interest and attention to Toronto’s forgotten football franchise; and the one thing that may make it fun to go see a football game in Toronto again, tail gating.
This is great news for a franchise and what is left of a fan base who wanted more of a football friendly experience that just couldn’t happen at the concrete confines of Rogers Center. The goal of course is to attract a younger generation of fan base, something that was not possible under previous ownership.
Another battle the Argos will have is with media right here in Toronto. The new ownership group includes Bell and Larry Tanenbaum, 2/3s of the ownership group that makes up MLSE. a notable absence from the new Argo ownership group is Rogers who also own Sportsnet.
Sportsnet has surpassed TSN in regards to relevance in mainstream media with the NHL contract (broadcasting rights until 2025), Broadcasting the Blue Jays, owning the Blue Jays and ownership of the Jays stadium (Rogers Center). TSN (a division of Bell media) has the broadcasting rights to the CFL.
CFL fans already know that Rogers has a way of intervening with anything Argos lately in the Toronto media. When the former owner David Braley and the league announced the sale of the Argos and the long awaited move out of Rogers Center into BMO Field, it should have been front page stuff. Instead, the Rogers announced signing Mike Babcock to a mega contract with the Leafs and hailed him as the savior of the starving Leafs franchise – only minutes before the Argos’ news conference.
As news approached of the new rebranding of the Argos becoming visible again in Toronto, Sportsnet fan590 host Dean Blundell decided to make it known he doesn’t care.
If you were held against your will for a week and had to watch either the #CFL or the #MLS, which would you choose?
— Dean Blundell (@ItsDeanBlundell) May 17, 2016
Is this the act of a dried up radio host trolling for some views? CFL fans have come to expect this kind of treatment from media giant Rogers, as they remain unwilling to acknowledge that the new move and rebranding will be great for the league that is broadcast by its rival Bell?
.@ItsDeanBlundell I know you’re trolling for reactions, but this, from Friday’s Globe & Mail. Have a great day. #CFLpic.twitter.com/njixuJORJH
— Paulo Senra (@paulosenra) May 17, 2016
Or is this just a result of misplaced thinking? Based on the Globe and Mail chart in the above tweet, the CFL remains highly relevant in Canada. With some well placed marketing in the re-branding of the Argos, a major media presence, and a fresh new response to pokes from the likes of Sportsnet, maybe the Argos will come back from the dead in Toronto.
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