BuyCanadianFirst wants you to do one thing, which is … buy Canadian products, as the name suggests.
In case you didn’t get the concept, they included a generous amount of maple leafs in the website’s design, bright reds and whites, plus 16 instances of the word “canada” in the homepage.
The venture in itself was started last October by Isabelle Rémy, who wanted to gather in one place all consumer products made by Canadian companies. There is a more elaborate story here; where she links the website’s inception to the rise of globalization and the wish to offer an alternative to imported products.
The back story is cool and inspiring; although this is the kind of project that I would have expected to come from a federal agency. Or maybe from a trade association which would want to advertise a category of products. Melissa Thibodeau, the Director of Marketing and Business Development explains though that it’s a private venture and they’ve planned from the beginning a variety of revenue models, from listing fees, affiliate marketing, advertisings and also sponsorships.
BuyCanadianFirst has for instance a whole media / blog section which I guess is geared at driving traffic to the website and also build up an audience of Canadians interested at buying regularly Canadian-made products.
The second section of the website is an exhaustive product database, with the aim of covering all consumer goods. You can’t buy directly the products though as they refer you to the store or manufacturer of the product.
Since I am not a heavy shopper, I am not really planning to use regularly BuyCanadianFirst. I do know though that there will be an audience for the website, in a world where most consumers don’t buy anymore for the inherent functionality of a product but mostly for its different emotional value or the product story. Good luck then to the buyCanadian team!
Comments
BuyCanadianFirst.ca August 15, 2008
Nice write-up on http://www.BuyCanadianFirst.ca by @mtw Read it: http://tinyurl.com/5qbyud – Thanks Heri!
Lindsay Tatro January 24, 2011
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