The Vancouver Canadians haven’t got a long and glorious past when it comes to marketing.

Sure, they tried for many years to break through the Vancouver sporting press embargo on anything not rhyming with ‘eye sockey’, but they did it with baby-steps and mis-steps more often than not, and a distinct lack of vision; at least until recently.

Here’s a few examples of what I’m talking about:

Blah marketing: Paying ten grand for the exclusive Vancouver appearance of Dora The Explorer. Then forgetting to advertise she’s coming.
Great marketing: Bringing out the San Diego Chicken and promoting the living crap out of him. 

Blah marketing: Putting a large fake glove on the outfield fence with a plan to give away $100k if anyone hits it, only to abandon the plan when it becomes clear you can’t afford the prize.
Great marketing: "Hit bull win steak. Hit grass win salad."

Blah marketing: Having two kids build a giant polystyrene sandwich.
Great marketing: Letting every kid run the bases after the game.

Blah marketing: Having a random executive from Granville Island Brewery throw out the first pitch.
Great marketing: Having Sam Sullivan’s Transformer-style wheelchair-catapult throw out the first pitch. 

Blah marketing: Having Jose Lima sing the national anthem.
Great marketing: Putting his wife out there next to him. (Mother of God!)

Blah marketing: Putting two fans in sumo suits and having them wrestle on the third base line.
Great marketing: Putting a beer hawker in one sumo suit, having
him play a WWE-style arch-villain, and offering fans a prize if they
can be the one to beat him in best of three falls.

Blah marketing: "And you’ve won two cans of Campbell’s Chunky Chili!"
Great marketing: Mini-donuts.

Blah marketing: Sending out a press release to announce you have a new logo.
Great marketing: Inviting the press to come see your new uniforms, alongside representatives from every pro team this city has had since the 40’s, in the jerseys of their time. 

That last one happened just a few days ago, and not only did every freaking media outlet show up, but they covered the hell out of the affair.

The Vancouver Sun (full disclosure: they pay my wages these days) wrote the story up not once, but twice on the day, then again a day later, and had a photo gallery online, and gave the whole package several days of prominence on the front of their website.

And today, four days later – they’re still talking about it.

From today’s Dr. Sport column by Greg Douglas:

HERE ‘N’ THERE: The Louisville Slugger baseball bat Arnie Hallgren brought along as a prop for the Canadians unveiling of their new uniforms at Nat Bailey Stadium this week had a special significance. Hallgren was a 75-year-old little boy again as he posed wearing his 1954 Vancouver Capilanos jersey. The cherished bat had been given to him by the old Milwaukee Braves 55 years ago when they made Hallgren the first-ever player from B.C. to crack a major league roster. "Until today," an emotional Hallgren said, "the bat had never been out of its original plastic packaging."

When the story is still going several days after the event, you haven’t just had a successful photo op, you’ve successfully changed the sporting news landscape.

The C’s wanted to embrace baseball history in this city, and while they’ve done that pretty darn well behind the scenes, the bigger job is to rebrand yourself so the public acknowledges it as well. 

Mission accomplished, C’s.