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A cheeky Toronto marketing campaign playing on the Maple Leafs’ early playoff exit has put a Nova Scotia golf resort in the national spotlight, and the timing isn’t accidental. Fox Harb’r Resort is in the middle of its biggest capital investment ever, well north of $40 million, as it pushes to become one of Canada’s premier golf destinations.
Founded in 2000 by the late Tim Hortons co-founder Ron Joyce, the Resort recently plastered Toronto’s underground PATH network with golf-themed digital ads consoling Leafs fans. It is part of a deliberate push to grow its Ontario market as it completes a major overhaul of its golf offering, spa and residential community.
“We want to continue to have brand awareness in that marketplace,” says president Kevin Toth, noting the resort has historically focused its marketing efforts closer to home.
The campaign, developed by Halifax agency Wunder, leans into the old hockey joke that an early playoff exit just means golf season starts sooner. Ads running across Toronto’s financial district feature headlines like “Don’t worry, there are 18 cups waiting for you here,” directing fans to a custom microsite at rinktolinks.com.
Assorted images from Fox Harb’r’s cheeky marketing campaign, designed to show disappointed Leafs’ fans that there’s a bright side to being out of the playoffs. (Images provided by Wunder)
Wunder creative director Stephen Flynn says the PATH, Toronto’s underground pedestrian network connecting office towers and transit hubs in the financial district, was chosen for both speed and audience. The ads were live within days of the Leafs’ elimination, and the crowd moving through those tunnels fit the resort’s target demographic.
“The campaign is really just Maritime hospitality,” Flynn said. “Come out, we’ll get you on the course, and we won’t talk about the playoffs unless you want to.”
Wunder was brought on as Fox Harb’r’s agency earlier this year, with a full brand repositioning campaign set to roll out in 2027. The Toronto blitz, Flynn says, was an opportunity to create some early buzz while the bigger work is still in progress.
The expansion underway is the most ambitious in Fox Harb’r’s 25-year history. Two new 18-hole golf courses designed by prominent Canadian architects Doug Carrick and Tom McBroom anchor a buildout that also includes a new 15,000-square-foot spa and hydro wellness studio, 18 luxury townhomes by acclaimed Nova Scotia architect Brian MacKay-Lyons, a 20-bay TrackMan golf learning facility, an 18-hole putting course and 40 new on-site staff apartments. The new courses are expected to be fully open by May 2027, but this season golfers can play a hybrid layout of the front nine of each course while construction on the remaining holes wraps up.
“We wanted to create two distinct experiences and give guests a reason to stay more than one night,” Toth says, noting the average Fox Harb’r stay is currently just over two nights.
The investment represents a new chapter for a resort that Joyce built as a legacy project first and a business second. He acquired the 1,100-acre property near his hometown of Tatamagouche in 1987 and opened the resort in 2000, operating it at a loss for decades. Records filed with the Nova Scotia Utility and Review Board in a property tax dispute spanning 2022 to 2024 revealed those losses peaked at $8-to-$10 million annually until his death in 2019. Lawyers for the resort argued that the property’s remote location and poor financial performance made it impossible to value. After his death, his heirs reduced those losses to between $1.5 and $2 million annually.
Under son Steven Joyce’s leadership as CEO and owner, the outlook has shifted. “Our intention is to have a profitable operation,” Toth says. “This is more than just a legacy project.” He says revenues have more than doubled since Covid, and the expansion is designed to build on that momentum.
The resort is also benefiting from a broader shift in Canadian travel patterns. Nova Scotia tourism was up 11 per cent last year, according to Toth, and Fox Harb’r is tracking on par in 2026. Toth attributes part of that to Canadians avoiding U.S. travel amid trade tensions. “We’re seeing more Canadians choosing to stay in Canada,” he said. “And we wanted to remind them to think about coming to the East Coast.”
Fox Harb’r has always attracted a certain calibre of guest with Tiger Woods holding the course record of 63, set in 2009. Wayne Gretzky and a handful of U.S. presidents have also been among the visitors, according to travel publications.
The resort now has its sights set on competing with Cabot Resort in Inverness, whose Cabot Cliffs and Cabot Links courses ranked first and fifth among Canada’s best public golf courses in 2025. Toth frames the relationship as collaborative: two Nova Scotia resorts working together to grow the province as a golf destination. “Our goal is to be among the very best resorts in Canada,” he said.
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