Rumours and things

I don’t know what the sales of the NHL Tampa Bay Lightening means to the bottom line for Victoria’s Len Barrie but it must ease the pressure a little bit although the two owners of the team, Barrie and Oren Koules the TV producer, have got to have lost some big bucks on the sale of the franchise to Boston investors. I don’t believe the big issue was money except for Barrie who is the developer who created the magnificent Bear Mountain resort complex in Victoria. There are all kinds of rumours where he got the money to invest in the NHL team and there is word that investors like Rob Blake, Ryan Smith, Rob Niedermayer, Matt Pettinger, Mike Vernon, Joe Nieuwendyk, Gary Roberts, Mike Sillinger, Trevor Kidd, Sean Burke and Scott Mellanby all investors in the Victoria property, are we are told, asking for their money back. According to reports they believe the developer for other endeavors used their money or money from the resort for other endeavors like the buying of the franchise. Nothing has been proved.

There was a rumour never confirmed that just weeks ago the NHL helped to make the Florida team’s monthly payroll. The team on its best night was making maybe $400,000 in receipts for their home games. That amount would hardly cover the pay cheque of their star Vincent Lecavalier at $16 million a season.

I don’t know what is happening at The Bear Mountain Resort because it was reported that a moneyman from Dubai was going to come into the picture for $350 million but they seem to have their own problems at the moment. My sources in Victoria tell me that there is interest in the huge resort and that something maybe happening. We’ll wait and see.

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After six years in the making Sparkling Hill Resort is almost ready to impress the world. But we will have to wait a few more weeks. After much consultation, the management has decided to delay the grand opening of Sparkling Hill Resort until April 30, 2010.

Building of the 240,000 sq.ft. resort that has been carved out of the granite bedrock, started less than two years ago. It has been well planned and the project has stayed on budget and until now, on time. Over 350 tradesmen have been working around the clock towards the deadline but some key and unique architectural designs for the resort are many structural components are from Europe. Much of the short delay is due to the unforeseen difficulties of bringing in such large and unique shipments.

One particular piece cannot miss its North American debut and that is the -110 degrees Celsius Cold Sauna. It had to be fabricated in Germany, then dismantled, shipped in pieces and rebuilt on site.

The resort project is estimated at $100 million. The luxury hotel will have 152 guest rooms and a wellness area hosting the cold sauna as well as a trio of therapeutic pools and seven uniquely different saunas as well as 48 treatment rooms offering a variety of classic treatments like massages and facials. The fitness centre has a full view of the mountains to the east while the outdoor infinity pool will have views to the west over Okanagan Lake.
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Canada has a well-educated workforce that has not been given the required physical capital—machinery and equipment, infrastructure and buildings—to maximize output. This helps to explain the country’s sluggish productivity growth over the past 25 years, the Conference Board argues in a new report.

“Canada’s slow productivity growth over the last 25 years cannot be attributed to its labour force,” said Alan Arcand, Principal Research Associate. “Labour quality has improved steadily since 1961. However, capital intensity, which grew rapidly in the 1960s and 1970s, slowed between 1983 and the mid-2000s. Essentially, we have under-invested in physical capital.

“It’s therefore no surprise that Canada’s productivity growth also began to slow around the same time and pales in comparison to other developed countries.”

The Conference Board has argued for more than a decade that Canada’s poor productivity performance has been hurting its ability to compete globally.

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It is one of those retail rumours that never seem to go away. We have a number of them, IKEA, Old Navy, and Target.

The one in the spotlight today is Target or “Tar-Jay” as the shopper likes to call it. I believe I have written about this discount chain of “cheap-chic” clothing for years. I even had a friend of mine in Toronto on the inside for a few years and he would feed me the latest information. We thought we were onto something when the Hudson Bay was up for sale a few years ago and the story on the street was that the Zellers chain owned by The Bay was going to end up in the Target Corp plans to make an entry into the Canadian retail marketplace. This was a sure thing according to all those in the know and it probably wouldn’t be more than 100 stores across the country. Target was coming to Canada. Wherever that story came from someone forgot to tell Target at their home base in Minneapolis.

Wouldn’t you just know it. That old rumour got a new burst of life this past month as like many retailers in the U.S. the story was that Target was mulling over a move outside their home market since last year was not what you would call a growth year in U.S. retail. Profits went down.

So the old standby rumour got its workout again with the Canada being mentioned as the place to expand the Target brand. But officials in Minneapolis said not right now, we are not thinking about Canada.

The company plans to spend $1 billion renovating 340 stores, adding what do think? Yes, more groceries.

So there you have it another rumour bites the dust.