Renaming BC Place

I’ve been tracking the BC Place construction progress since it began in May of 2010, following the Vancouver Winter Olympics, and this past weekend public were able to check out the renovations in person during an Open House.

Photo credit: Bob Lai / Bob Lai Photography on Flickr

With BC Place being the home of the BC Lions and Vancouver Whitecaps FC (as of this September) there has been speculation over sponsors and in particular naming rights for the refurbished stadium. It was announced that Budweiser will be the official beer of both teams, and Bell has rights with the Whitecaps. However, Telus has stepped into the picture as well.

This morning Bob Mackin shared a link to an article he wrote for the Vancouver Courier where questions about naming rights for BC Place come up with BC Pavilion Corporation (PavCo) chairman David Podmore. “I can’t comment on any Telus deal,” David Podmore told the Courier during Sunday’s public open house. “We’ll have an announcement around naming rights and sponsorship, probably I’d think around the middle of September.”

Seeing as how BC Place is next door to Rogers Arena (which already has nicknames like the “Call Centre”), I put the word out on Twitter asking what the area around Rogers Arena and (potentially) Telus Place would be called. Here are a few of the responses I received:

With more and more corporate sponsorships of prominent buildings (like Telus World of Science aka the Telusphere aka Science World) and even talk of having sponsored SkyTrain stations, this step comes as no surprise for the currently un-attached BC Place. We’ll have to wait until mid-September, around the time of the re-opening, to get any official word or confirmation.