It almost didn't feel like a commercial. Three weeks ago, during the television broadcast of the Vancouver 2010 Opening Ceremonies, Tim Hortons THI-T launched a 90-second spot that played like a modern Canadian heritage vignette: A father, apparently a recent immigrant from a southern African nation, has a tearful airport reunion with his wife and two young daughters.
The product placement was masterful. As the fellow hands his wife a Tim Hortons coffee, he says, with a hint of boast in his voice, “Welcome to Canada,” but her attention is drawn to the bags full of winter clothing he has brought along to outfit the family. She barely notices the gesture.
The ad struck a chord across the country and threw Tim Hortons into the national dialogue as people debated its use of the immigrant experience to sell coffee and carbohydrates.
“This ad stands out as a very polished piece,” said Robert Seiler, the emeritus professor of communications studies at the University of Calgary, who wrote a 2002 semiotic analysis of Molson's iconic I Am Canadian “Rant” for the American Review of Canadian Studies.
Still, he suggested the Tim Hortons spot bordered on intellectual dishonesty. “It misrepresents our treatment of immigrants,” he said, noting the extraordinary hurdles most newcomers face before they are absorbed into Canadian society. “Immigrants and people who have worked with immigrants will reject the self-congratulatory story conveyed here.”
Even with the criticism, and the online comments about emotional manipulation, the discussion proves that Tims operates at the intersection of commerce and culture that few other companies can hope to approach. The company was parodied on the Air Farce . Fans make videos about their devotion to the chain. Four years ago, newspaper columnists weighed in on the meaning of another popular commercial in which a Chinese immigrant father who tried to quash his son's desire to play hockey turns out to have been a secret supporter all along.
Which is why encountering Tims in the U.S., where the company is in the middle of a robust expansion, can be an unsettling, oddly sterile experience.
For even as the company was tugging Canadian hearts throughout the Olympics, south of the border Tims had a spot on the air promoting a breakfast wrap that could be bought for only $1.89. That followed previous commercials for a blueberry bonanza (blueberry muffins, blueberry glaze doughnuts, blueberry bloom doughnuts), a coffee-and-sandwich deal, and a fresh sandwich with three deli meats. Nowhere are there spots aiming to make a higher, emotional connection with customers.
The push by Tims outside its natural geographic borders is a case study in both the delicate nature of brands and the need to build them from the ground up, where products and services are experienced by people who are individuals first and consumers second.
Numerous Canadian companies have sought to use their success at home as a springboard into other territories. But with few exceptions, those who have made it abroad have done so after conducting a nationalistic cleansing of the brand, ensuring the red and white is rarely seen.
U.S. Tim Hortons ad
The Canadian roots of Research in Motion are nowhere to be seen, even inside of Canada, helping to ensure that a majority of U.S. consumers believe BlackBerry is an American invention. As it has gained distribution throughout the world, Lush Cosmetics has similarly played down its Canadian birthplace. (When the stores set down in New York a few years ago, consumers initially thought the chain was either British or Australian.) A bold effort by Roots to expand into the U.S. carrying the Canadian flag on its back ended in retreat. The company now has only four stores south of the border, though it has almost 30 stores scattered throughout Taiwan, where Brand Canada has an exoticism it could never achieve in the U.S.
