Municipalities use Olympics to woo new business

by Globe & Mail — November 10, 2009

Attention, all business leaders: If you're seriously interested in moving your operations to Vancouver, you could be in line for an almost-all-expenses-paid trip to the region during the Olympics, complete with Games tickets.

A group of Lower Mainland municipalities has banded together to bring in 100 people from 50 companies during the Games in February, in the hopes of wooing them to settle here permanently.

The cost: $1.5-million to cover meals, hotels, local transpo use rtation and Olympics tickets for 100 visitors for four days. (They have to cover their own airfares.)

The long-term value: Well, no one can quite say, but they're pretty sure it will pay off somehow.

"This is the most powerful opportunity this region will have to brand itself," Vancouver Mayor Gregor Robertson said as he helped announce the initiative yesterday along with Surrey Mayor Dianne Watts and Richmond Mayor Malcolm Brodie.

"Other cities competing with us are well-armed with resources," the mayor said. "However, they don't have the 2010 Games."

And so the cities are using that advantage to pitch their best case.

The three are part of a nine-city consortium called Metro Vancouver Commerce (subtitle: Powerhouse Paradise) that formed three years ago to co-operate in enticing businesses they think would be interested to come to this region - businesses that they might otherwise have to spend much more money courting in expensive trade missions.

"We're jumping on this with great gusto," Coquitlam Mayor Richard Stewart said.

"With a population of 125,000, it's hard for us to go around the world."

So his municipality is happy to throw in some money and any Games tickets it might have available to entertain visiting business leaders. (The federal government is putting in $800,000 through its Western Economic Diversification Department.)

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Source:Globe & Mail