It's official:
Olympic Spirit set to close
Downtown attraction poorly attended
Needs millions to stay open, CEO says
Jul. 20, 2006. 01:00 AM
JIM BYERS
SPORTS REPORTER
Toronto's Olympic Spirit has run dry.
Officials for the downtown attraction, which opened in August 2004 and featured displays and interactive exhibits featuring Canadian Olympians, will hold a press conference today to announce its closure.
"I think it's really sad," said three-time Olympic rowing gold medallist Marnie McBean, Olympic Spirit's director of corporate and athlete programs.
"It is an amazing facility and was supposed to boost athletes, athleticism, the Olympic movement, as well as Toronto's tourist business.
"We never saw people coming in in droves," she said an interview. "But I believed strongly in it. It was fun, as well as educational and respectful."
Olympic Spirit president and CEO Jay Whiteside told the Star that backers of the attraction, located next to Dundas Square in an area the city is trying to revitalize, spent more than $50 million for capital works.
Whiteside wouldn't reveal the figures but said there were "very significant operating losses" and that it would take millions of dollars to get back on track.
Olympic Spirit often attracted 1,000 school kids a day, he said, but there never was enough money to draft a plan to attract more walk-up visitors.
When the attraction opened, Whiteside said, there were clear directions from the International Olympic Committee, which runs the Olympic Games and licensed what was to be the first of several attractions aimed at promoting the Games and raising more revenue. But things changed once Vancouver won the 2010 Winter Olympics.
Under IOC rules, when Vancouver won the Games the Olympic marketing rights in Canada shifted from the Canadian Olympic Committee to the Vancouver organizing committee VANOC. Whiteside said Olympic Spirit had worked hand in hand with the COC, but "all the collaboration stopped" once VANOC took over.
"We've been abandoned by the IOC and VANOC and allowed ... to bleed to death," he said.
Asked what Vancouver organizers should have done, he replied, "It's a matter for the imagination. This is the centre of corporate Canada. It's the only permanent Olympic installation with the Olympic brand that's located west of the Rocky Mountains."
Renee Smith-Valade, VANOC's vice-president of communications, said the committee didn't have a mandate to ensure Olympic Spirit's financial health but did encourage their sponsors to help.
"We're clearly disappointed it hasn't proven to be financially viable," she told the Star. "Toronto is an important market for us and we would've been delighted to have a storefront presence in the city."
Roughly 20 full-time and 20 part-time staffers will lose their jobs, Whiteside said.
The building will remain open for a couple of months for previously booked corporate events.
Although city money was not invested in the project, he said the closing could be a blow to Toronto's redevelopment plan downtown.
Financial supporters did the research before backing the project and showed it to be a welcome attraction to the downtown core, Whiteside said.
"Canadians love the Olympics and love Olympic athletes. ... Olympic heroes are people we all love," he said. "The stories we tell are stories people love to here. We did exit surveys of patrons and 87 per cent gave it a five rating out of five. The Themed Entertainment Association in March of last year gave us their award of excellence, the first Canadian attraction ever to earn that."
But somehow it all just wasn't enough, Whiteside said.
