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Winter Olympics: Do Medals Matter?



Letter to the Editor

Globe and Mail

Sunday, Feb. 28, 2010

Why do medals matter? Do they make us healthier, wiser, more caring? Do we become better citizens? What values do we invest in those pieces of gold, silver and bronze?

What does it say about us that we need these expensive distractions, which showcase a very small number of privileged athletes who play games extremely well? Does it speak to our need for heroes and role models, our sense of national identity?

Bertolt Brecht, playwright and party pooper, said it best: Pity the country that needs heroes. We don't need to own podiums. We need to own a more confident sense of self. Then maybe we can enjoy the Games without worrying so much about who wins and loses.

Claude Adams


March 16, 2010

Drugs, lions, snow etc.


Budding filmmaker Misha Kleider felt he had to sample cocaine and heroin to “understand the street” (A Walk On The Drug Side – March 16).

I admire his pluck. I just hope he applies a different modus operandi to any exploration of documentary subjects such as assisted suicide, lion taming or avalanche skiing.

Claude Adams, Surrey, B.C.

The Search for Olympic Riches


By Claude Adams

Three years after the 2002 Winter Games in Salt Lake City, a Utah furniture dealer was meeting with a group of visiting businesspeople representing the Vancouver Board of Trade. They had come to learn more about how a community can benefit from a world-class event like the Olympics. When the visitors asked him if having the Games in his state helped his business, the dealer grinned, shook his head and said, “Latvians don’t buy sofas.” Embedded in the joke was a truism that most B.C. businesses should take to heart as the 2010 Games unfold in Vancouver and Whistler: if you were hoping for a windfall of wild and reckless spending from the expected 250,000 visitors, you’ll probably be disappointed. For the most part, business spinoffs will be modest, of limited duration and selective. Hotels, restaurants, ski resorts and security services will do very well, thank you. They always do in mega-events. But even in these sectors, once the Latvians, Americans, Germans and other foreign visitors go home in March, things could get very, very quiet. That sofa may be sitting in your showroom window for another year or so.

The moral: trim your Olympic expectations. And take the long view. “People aren’t coming from around the world to buy furniture or artwork but to enjoy the Games,” says Bernie Magnan, chief economist of the Vancouver Board of Trade. “If you can get them to come back, that’s when you might get them to spend a whole lot of money.” In other words, make them feel good while they’re here and don’t block their views of the breathtaking images of Whistler and English Bay – then maybe they’ll return someday as visitors, investors or entrepreneurs. That’s when the Latvians might open their wallets.

Read the entire article here in BC Business magazine.