This weekend we had the delightful opportunity to have a cup of coffee with local musician Aaron Booth and his family. Booth has a new CD, available here, but ours was a social visit, and in the course of our conversation, Booth mentioned that he felt Calgary, as a city, was more brand conscious than others. This comment resonated with us.
Surely, everyone feels that their city is somehow unique, and we are no exception in our belief that there is an aspect to Calgary missing from other cities. At least, an aspect that we feel is worth investigating. In terms of demographics, Calgary exists in an intriguing location as a magnet for migration. One of the factors "pulling" newcomers to the city for the past thirty years has been the allure of riches. Literally. The promise of Calgary has been the promise of employment, supposedly higher wages, and the opportunity to create a better life (largely in terms of material prosperity). If you can hear a voice whispering "What happens in Calgary, stays in Calgary", you might not be too far off the mark. Very little has been done in terms of reflecting on who such a promise attracts.
Booth's comments led us to wonder how much the promise of personal re-invention plays in the decision to move to Calgary. We feel it is easy to believe that someone to whom personal re-invention rests at least partially on the promise of increased wealth, would be very eager to demonstrate this new identity through the display of wealth. As corporations move increasinly to branding consumer goods as part of a lifestyle, the consumption of brands can be seen as an integral part to communicating this new social identity. Just think about the battle of coffee consumption, Starbucks and Tim Horton's conjure up very different customer images.
The risk here is that it would be easy to divide the city's population into native-born (or naturalized) citizens and newcomers. Supposedly, one could suspect that the native-born citizens would not feel the allure of personal re-invention based on increased wealth as much as the newcomers, otherwise the native-borns would leave for parts unknown but of greater promise. This would help to explain the partial successes on local, non-chain brands, such as Higher Ground, one of Calgary's longest-running independent coffee houses, standing two doors down as it does, from a typically packed Starbucks.
2 comments:
Interesting thoughts - perhaps the native-borns don't leave because they have, and have always had, the belief that it just doesn't get better than Calgary. This supposition is reinforced by the anecdotal evidence that non-natives (others) continue to move to Calgary.
Does Higher Ground capitalize on native cachet?
Your first point is probably true. Why leave if you're already established in a place everyone else seems to want to be? I'm not sure if Higher Ground is trading on its native cachet - in fact, I'm not even sure what that would look like. Superficially, perhaps some attempt to ground itself historically? Having emerged from the city's arts/alternative scene, it is currently placing its emphasis on its stance as an independent shop.
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