Name game
Sports arenas like Halifax’s Metro Centre find a new revenue stream

Halifax’s Metro Centre is the latest sports arena to sell its naming rights to the highest bidder.

In June, Scotiabank signed an agreement to invest $650,000 annually in the centre for the next 10 years in exchange for holding the naming rights to the facility. The Metro Centre, which opened in 1978, will now be known as the Scotiabank Centre.

Dan Shaw, a professor at Dalhousie University’s Rowe School of Business and an expert in marketing strategy, thinks the deal to plunk its name on the Metro Centre – home of the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League’s über popular Halifax Mooseheads squad – makes a lot of sense for Scotiabank. “It is prime real estate and a heavily used facility,” Shaw says. “There are a lot of different target markets going in there and lots of business people going in there. It gets lots of mentions in the media and lots of people walk through there. I think it fortifies a key market for them in a competitive space.”

But the Metro Centre isn’t the only sports arena that’s considered selling naming rights to bring in additional revenue. Here is a rundown of how other arenas in Atlantic Canada have handled the naming rights issue.

Mile One Centre St. John’s, N.L.
The name “Mile One” is actually owned by Danny Williams, the former premier of Newfoundand and Labrador.

Harbour Station Saint John, N.B.
No company has ponied up to buy the naming rights of this arena, which opened in 1993.

Eastlink Centre Charlottetown, P.E.I.
Eastlink struck an agreement in 2013 to buy the naming rights for the facility. The terms of the deal have never been made public. The Guardian newspaper has reported it cost Eastlink anwhere from $50,000 to $100,000 per year in a multi-year deal to win the naming rights.