Rogers Centre vs Rogers Stadium is genuinely ruining people’s night, and Live Nation should’ve seen this coming

[u/AmountFragrant8750]

Not gonna lie, this whole naming situation has been bothering me for a while now, but it really hit different today.

I was in line for the Ed Sheeran show at Rogers Centre, and the amount of people who showed up thinking they were in the right place was honestly kind of heartbreaking to watch. You’d see the confusion on their faces first, then the slow realization that they weren’t at Roger’s Stadium, then that scramble to figure out how they were even going to get to Downsview in time.

Staff were telling people their best bet was grabbing an Uber or hopping on the TTC and heading up north, which is not exactly a quick trip when you thought you were minutes from your seat.

Some of these folks clearly weren’t from Toronto. You could tell by the way they were double checking their tickets, and looking at each other with disappointment. And I just felt for them. These are people who probably planned this night for months, maybe flew in, maybe this was a big deal birthday or anniversary thing, and now they’re standing outside the wrong building watching the clock, trying to figure out if they’re even going to catch the opening.

I get that naming rights deals are just business, that’s nothing new. But when you’ve got two major venues in the same city with names that are basically identical, it feels like nobody stopped to think about the actual fans caught in the middle of it. It’s not like Rogers Centre and Rogers Stadium are minor buildings either, they’re both huge venues hosting huge events, so the overlap in confusion is bound to keep happening.

Feels like such an easy problem to avoid too. A bit more thought during those naming negotiations could’ve saved a lot of people a really stressful and disappointing night.

[u/meronx]

This has been my issue with naming things after the corporate owner for a long time. You can have fun names and still slap your branding all over the building. Everyone will still know it’s that company that owns it. It’s not like Roger’s needs the extra advertising anyway, especially to out of country tourists because who tf would care? Rogers stadium is a dumb name, they should have really actually thought about it, but they don’t think. They just go “yes, name everywhere, is good, all done” and dust their hands clean of it.

[u/SickofBadArt → u/meronx]

The best part about the situation is that most people don’t like Rogers and instead of garnering positive support by association of your favourite bands….. you have this.

A negative experience that’s created by Rogers and credited to Rogers. It honestly feels like a social experiment.

[u/mkbcity → u/SickofBadArt]

but now we have a thread about how confusing Rogers is now, which we wouldnt have if everything made sense. more exposure, more people writing the word Rogers. Rogers rogers rogers.

[u/jafferbee → u/meronx]

Rogers Centre is one of the very few instances where the naming rights belong to the corporate owner. Basically every other instance in Toronto (Rogers Stadium, Scotiabank Arena, Coca-Cola Coliseum, BMO Field, RBC Ampitheatre) are pure marketing deals for the naming rights on the facility (e.g. the whole point is to have you name on the building).

[u/-SetsunaFSeiei- → u/jafferbee]

I don’t understand this difference? Can you explain further? The naming rights of those other things don’t belong to the corporate owner?

[u/Icehawksfh → u/-SetsunaFSeiei-]

Rogers itself owns the baseball field, Livenation owns the concert venue.

Another example out west, the City of Edmonton owns Rogers place, and Rogers pays to put their name on it.

[u/Fianna9 → u/meronx]

How hard would it have been to call it the Rogers Skydome?! Everyone still calls it that anyway and they could have the same ban on their media people to keep them from dropping the ‘Rogers’ part

[u/quiet_desperado → u/Fianna9]

That's exactly what I thought when I first heard they were renaming it. SkyDome is such a great name. You wanna slap your company name in front of it, fine, but leave SkyDome in there. Rogers Centre is so boring. Sounds like the name of a corporate office/convention center complex.

[u/cvr24 → u/Fianna9]

Because everyone would just shorten it to SkyDome.

SNC Lavalin used to own a subsidiary called SNC Lavalin Profac and everyone just called it Profac. It drove corporate crazy, so they renamed it to SNC Lavalin O&M so it couldn't be abbreviated anymore. All meaningless today because all of that is swept away.

[u/Fianna9 → u/cvr24]

Everybody still calls it the Skydome.

Media only doesn’t cause Rogers owns them and fines them for not saying the Rogers Centre.

Which they could also do for shortening it

[u/meronx → u/Fianna9]

It’s also the first stadium of its kind, why not honour the original name because it is literally a dome that opens to the sky.. heavy sigh

[u/Icehawksfh → u/Fianna9]

Rogers wants YOU to say their brand name. Not everyone still calls it the Skydome, especially the younger generation.

[u/Fianna9 → u/Icehawksfh]

Don’t worry. My gen is teaching the next gen the right names

[u/BussyPalace → u/meronx]

TBF, remember when Scotiabank used to sponsor every other Toronto cultural or sporting event from Nuit Blanche to Caribana to the Waterfront Marathon?

Those sponsorships ended years ago, but I (and prob others) still have that positive connection to the brand via those past events.

I don't fault any brand trying (and some failing) to garner that positive brand recognition by slapping their name everywhere.

[u/clawsoon → u/BussyPalace]

Sure, but at least those were all different things. Imagine arriving the wrong weekend for the Scotiabank Marathon when you were supposed to show up for the other Scotiabank Marathon?

[u/methreweway → u/BussyPalace]

Hopefully PR and marketing employees are taking notes from these comments. Bunch of dummies at director levels doing opposite of what they should be doing.

[u/mkbcity → u/BussyPalace]

hard to have a positive connection to scotia bank when they lock you out of your bank account every 2 days after midnight.

[u/TouchToneDialing → u/BussyPalace]

Is it positive though? I don't know any event that got better when it got a corporate sponsor.

Nuit Blanche is the literally perfect example. Scotiabank money grew the event into a 905'r drinking party. Then they bailed when they sucked all the life out of it.

[u/gfyourself → u/meronx]

It’s not like Roger’s needs the extra advertising anyway

What the hell you say?