What Québec Wants™

Québec's proposed French signage regulations give retailers much leeway.

New regulations would require businesses with non-French trademarks to display prominent French signage, whether it is a slogan, a description or a message about what’s on sale.

This is the government response to a 2014 ruling on a court action brought by Best Buy, Costco, Gap, Old Navy, Guess, Wal-Mart, Toys “R” Us and Curves that under existing language regulations, companies with an English brand name were not obliged to add a French phrase to their signs. The new rules will require that the French addition be in the same field of vision as the principal sign and that it be illuminated at night if the main sign is.

Many retailers in Québec already comply by adding a touch of French to their names either by adding an article or a French descriptor. Les cafés Starbucks. Le Body Shop. Crate & Barrel Maison. Winners Mode. Moore vêtements pour hommes.

The new rules would allow a retailer to comply by simply adding a French slogan. 

As such, the sign of the Roots store on Ste-Catherine Street in Montréal with "Depuis 1973" (Since 1973) would likely comply. And so does Tim Hortons Toujours Frais signage.

The rules will apply immediately after the regulations’ adoption to new signs, but there will be a three-year delay to bring existing signs into conformity.

For more on this, read our previous post, The upside of politeness in Québec

Quebeckers buy and receive less gift cards but they may get money back.

Gift cards are an increasingly common stocking stuffer, on which Canadians spend an estimated $6-billion a year. And judging by this ad for drugstore Jean Coutu appearing in yesterday's issue of the free daily 24 h, Quebeckers have plenty of options to choose from.

However, according to a survey conducted by Ipsos Reid last summer, Quebeckers appear to be significantly less likely than Canadians in the ROC to buy or receive gift cards. 72% of all Canadians claim to have bought or received at least one gift card in the past year compared to 64% of Quebeckers.

 

A refund obligation

There is also a difference in terms of the regulatory framework. In June, 2010 Quebec's Consumer Protection Act implemented legislation designed to protect purchasers of gift cards. The merchant must refund to the consumer, upon request, an amount equal to the balance on the card when the balance is lower than $5.00. The refund obligation – which does not have a parallel in any other province – is designed to prevent consumers from having to choose between losing the balance on their prepaid cards and overspending - except for a mobile telephone card or a prepaid credit card.

The upside of politeness in Québec

By Eric Blais

As expected, the Québec government indicated last week its intention to challenge Québec's Court of Appeal's ruling that the province cannot force companies to add a French component to their name.

UPDATE: At a news conference today, Hélène David, the minister responsible for the French Language Charter, said the government will oblige Québec retailers to add French descriptives to their outdoor banners. However, David confirmed Québec has decided not to appeal the Québec Court of Appeal ruling. Instead, it it will change the law at the level of regulations.

Several multinationals took the province to court after they were told by the Office québécois de la langue française to change their names or risk running afoul of the rules governing the language of business in the province. A Québec Superior Court judge sided with the companies, which included Walmart, Costco, Best Buy, Gap, Old Navy and Guess.

I leave it to others to debate whether this should be forced upon retailers through legislation. It's a sensitive issue but one marketers would be wise to consider from all angles before dismissing it as just one more obstacle to overcome when doing business in Québec.

Québec Premier Philippe Couillard was a brain surgeon before entering politics. He could also have been a marketer. This time, the governments appears to be adopting a slightly different tone. The narrative from past government on this delicate issue has often been about protecting the French language and the Québec nation's distinct identity. It still is but Mr. Couillard gave a different explanation for his government's position - one that sounds more like a marketer's viewpoint than a politician's.

The Premier gave the example of Second Cup:

“Everyone knows that they sell coffee, but it’s like this company said, ‘I know where I am, I know what environment I am in and recognize the existence of the French in Quebec.

“We don’t want to erase trademarks – it’s not that Canadian Tire will become Pneu canadien, let’s be clear on that, but it’s a question of politeness.”

A question of politeness

Most companies operating across geographies comply with local regulations while looking for efficiencies. It's not always an easy balance to achieve and Québec, with its many unique requirements, can be particularly challenging. Those who are frustrated by Québec's demand that a French descriptor be added to English trademarks will view this latest move as one more costly irritant.

Others will view it differently. Many already have; through a marketer's lens instead of a lawyer's.

The Premier called it a politesse, a courtesy. The importance of being courteous is nothing new to retailers. Let's stay with coffee. According to the J.D. Power and Associates 2012 Specialty Coffee Retailer Satisfaction Report, staff, more than price or merchandise offerings, is key to driving higher satisfaction among specialty coffee customers. One of the key staff factor is courtesy. It's not a stretch to suggest that adapting all brand touch points in Québec to cater to French-speaking customers can signal a higher level of courtesy, including the sign above a store's entrance.

A competitive advantage

Quebeckers will view a retailer's brand more favourably if it makes an effort to adjust to their needs. For retailers, adding a French descriptor to an English name is a symbolic way to signal that they are catering to them. There is directional evidence of this in the findings from our firm's What Québec Wants™ study. When we asked 3,000 Canadians whether they agreed or disagreed with the statement "I prefer to buy products and services from companies that make an effort to cater to the specific preferences and needs of people in my locality", 63% of French-speaking Quebeckers agreed compared to 50% of Canadians living in the ROC.

There are no doubt cost and operational implications for doing so. When Crate & Barrel added the word “maison” next to its name, it did what many others have done without being forced to. To quote the Premier again, "it said, 'I know what environment I am in" and I will brand myself accordingly.

There is no law forcing banks and other retailers to have signage in Chinese in Markham, Ontario and in other communities across Canada. They do so voluntarily. Clearly, these organizations see it as an investment instead of a cost. Even Québec's Banque Nationale thinks it's a business practice that will help its brand in that community.

Retailers should carefully consider their position on this issue. Rather than look at this as being forced to invest to protect the French language, they should consider assessing how it might benefit their brand to be the more polite one.

Target wants to “Excite the Kid in All of Us” this Christmas. That may be a tricky task in Québec.

All retailers are hoping for strong holiday sales but TARGET Canada has to be praying for the stars to finally align.

A release from the retailer issued last week offers a glimpse of what to expect in terms of its advertising during this holiday season. Under the theme “Excite the Kid in All of Us”, Target’s holiday marketing campaign is designed to “excite the kid in all of us with more surprises, magic and fun than ever before. The advertising boldly embraces the iconic elements that make Target, Target—using the red, white and Bullseye that guests love. The campaign will include broadcast, radio, out-of-home and digital catalogs.”

Let’s hope that the marketing folks at Target were mindful of Québec’s tough rules against advertising to children when they planned and crafted this campaign. Things are rarely black and white when it comes to interpreting the law. According to Québec’s Consumer Protection Office, “the fact that an advertisement or advertising method appears to target adults does not mean that the advertisement is intended exclusively for them. An advertisement that attracts the attention of children can still be considered as advertising directed at children even though it seems to target adults because of its verbal or written content.”

All Target needs now is to inadvertently be targetting kids.

For more on the law and its application, here’s a handy guide (in English).

It’s a cultural thing. Quebeckers' love affair with Tintin.

“It's a cultural thing: A strong opening in France has Paramount Pictures debuting Steven Spielberg and Peter Jackson's animated movie in the French-speaking Canadian province.”

That’s how the Hollywood Reporter announced back in 2011 the studio’s decision to hold the North American theatrical debut of ‘The Adventures of Tintin’ in Québec after having opened strongly in France and elsewhere in Europe.

It did not do very well in the US and the ROC although a sequel is apparently in the works.

Tintin and Quebeckers

Quebeckers’ love affair with Tintin is getting a boost this week with the release of the documentary ‘Au Québec avec Tintin” inspired by the book ‘Tintin et le Québec’ by Tristan Demers published in 2010. The documentary airing today on Télé-Québec takes a look at Tintin’s cultural and social impact in Québec through interviews with several Québec celebrities who were influenced by the character.

Tintin Little Treasures - puffed rice with caramel flavour

The documentary also reveals a little known-fact about Tintin; Quaker Oats introduced Tintin breakfast cereals in 1966. The brand was sold only in Québec and, according to an article in Le Magazine Maclean in March 1966 (yes, it was published in French back then before it was folded in L'actualité in 1976) the packaging was in French only when it was launched.

Much has changed over the past 50 years.

One major change that would have made Tintin’s adventure into sweetened breakfast cereals more challenging is Québec’s ban on advertising to children in 1980.

If the product advertised is consumed primarily by children and the advertisement uses fantasy, magic, or child-specific adventures, it cannot be aired during programming where more than 15% of the audience is children.

A study by Goldberg (1990) suggested that after its enactment in 1980, the Québec ban served to reduce children’s exposure to television commercials for sweetened cereals and consequently reduced children’s consumption of these products. Even though children were still exposed to American commercials, only the English-speaking Canadian children could recognize and were more aware of products that were advertised, such as toys and sweetened breakfast cereals, and had more of these in their homes than did French-speaking Canadian children. The French-speaking children were also less likely to urge their parents to purchase the advertised products.

Source: Goldberg ME. 1990 A quasi-experiment assessing the effectiveness of TV advertising directed at children. Journal of Marketing Research 27(4):445-454

 

 

Sign language in Québec

A follow-up to a post published in November 2012 about the language of storefront signs in Québec.

Here’s excerpt for some context:

Québec’s language watchdog, l'office québécois de la langue française (OQLF), wants retailers to change their signs to either give themselves a generic French name or add a slogan or explanation that reflects what it is they’re selling.

The law hasn’t changed but retailers are now being forced to comply with a new interpretation of an old law. So Walmart, Costco, Best Buy, Gap, Old Navy and Guess are taking the matter to court.

According to Section 63 of Quebec’s French Language Charter, the name of a business must be in French. However, it hasn’t generally been applied to trademarked names so several retailers like Walmart and Best Buy have set up shop under the same name that appears elsewhere in the world. Others, like Starbucks have adopted the bilingual name ‘Café Starbucks Coffee’.

A number of retailers went to court to challenge the OQLF’s interpretation of the Charter. The long awaited decision was delivered earlier this month by Justice Michel Yergeau of the Superior Court of Québec.

The court confirmed that a recognized trade-mark can be used on a storefront sign in Quebec without being accompanied by a generic description in French, even if that trade-mark is in English or another language than French.

For more on this, read this bulletin from law firm Blakes.

Stay tuned.

The attorney general has 30 days to file an appeal of this decision to the Court of Appeal of Québec.

Nutritional labels - informative only if you understand them.

Two years ago, Time Magazine ran a piece entitled “Building a Better Label”. It claimed that some food labels are designed to inform consumers while others are meant to confuse and seduce.

The article was prompted by the FDA’s “request for comments and information” on "ways to enhance the usefulness to consumers of information on the principal display panel of food products ('front-of-pack' labeling) or on shelf tags in retail stores." Simply put, the agency wanted to know how consumers read and use such nutritional information, and whether there's a way to standardize its presentation to help people make better choices.

Canadians and food labels

Had a similar request for comments and information been made of Canadians, the findings would have shown that a quarter of Canadians in English Canada say they “find it difficult to understand the nutrition terms on food labels”. That number climbs to 41% among French Quebeckers. According to findings from our What Québec Wants study on the grocery sector, French Quebeckers are more likely to struggle with the nutritional information found on food products. It's not a surprise then that 35% of French Quebeckers say they are “confused about how to eat a healthy diet” compared to 25% of Canadians in the ROC.

This reflects what we call the Life Uncomplicated Connector; Quebeckers’ desire to keep it simple, short and sweet. It’s what makes them significantly more likely to say that “reading is old fashioned - there are quicker and easier ways to find out what I want to know”.

Marketers have found ways to address this issues - some more transparent than others. They range from graphical representations of select nutritional information to “check marks” such as Health Check, Smart Choices, etc. to the UK’s “traffic lights” where color-coded traffic light labels — red (high), amber (medium) and green (low) — indicate levels of calories, sugars, fats and sodium in a food.

Traffic lights... that’s the kind of “quicker and easier way to find out what you want to know” that would likely please four in ten French Quebeckers.

Read more on these packaged-food labeling systems here.

For more about our What Québec Wants syndicated study, click here.

Related articles

FDA considers food label updates to make nutrition facts easier to read

Le secret de Victoria’s Secret

Québec’s language watchdog, the Office québécois de la langue française, wants retailers to change their signs to either give themselves a generic French name or add a slogan or explanation that reflects what it is they’re selling.

The law hasn’t changed but retailers are now being forced to comply with a new interpretation of an old law.

So Walmart, Costco, Best Buy, Gap, Old Navy and Guess are taking the matter to court.

According to Section 63 of Quebec’s French Language Charter, the name of a business must be in French. However, it hasn’t generally been applied to trademarked names so several retailers like Walmart and Best Buy have set up shop under the same name that appears elsewhere in the world.

Others, like Starbucks have adopted the bilingual name ‘Café Starbucks Coffee’.

The recently opened Crate and Barrel store at Place Laval is called ‘Crate & Barrel maison’.

It’s a new twist on an old debate. One that has made Québec a very unique place for retailers. And an expensive one. Case in point: ExxonMobil uses the name ‘On the Run’ untranslated on all its convenience stores all over the world. In Québec, however, it was forced to keep the name ‘Marché Express’ following a public outcry when it tried to change its name to align with the rest of its operations.

This is happening at a time when several U.S. retailers are entering the Québec market. Only time will tell if Victoria’s Secret will become Le Secret de Victoria.

Bell's circus act in Québec

The very public battle over Bell's plan to acquire Astral has generated much noise in the past weeks.

The most visible opponents are Québecor, Cogeco and Eastlink. Others, such as Rogers and Telus, have also made their views public and presented their case to the CRTC. According to La Presse, more than 832 organizations have made submissions to the CRTC on the proposed transaction which will hold public hearings starting September 10th.

Nowhere is the battle more visible than in Québec. The Québecor-owned Journal de Montréal has been running ads almost every day. The story is similar to the one being told in English Canada: "If approved, the giant new company would end up with a staggering 79 TV channels including HBO Canada, TSN, CTV and The Movie Network. This means you may face pressure to pay for Bell Canada services you don't want."

In Québec, however, the argument goes further and adopts a distinctly more nationalist tone. This deal is described by its opponents has posing a threat to Québec's cultural industry. The Société St-Jean Baptiste, the staunch defender of French language and culture, is quoted in this mocked movie poster as being "very bad news for Québec".

Aside from the issue of media concentration, opponents in Québec argue that it goes against Québec’s cultural interests. Some have gone has far as saying that George Cope, Bell’s CEO, does not speak French even when Bell’s annual meeting is held in Montreal. It’s a politically charged issue and the three major parties are against the deal. The PQ said it would do everything possible to block it. The leader of the CAQ, François Legault, stated that this transaction was bad for Québec and Jean Charest, while not publicly opposing the deal, indicated that his party wanted guarantees on the jobs, head office and operations of the new entity.

Bell’s bold response in Québec

Bell has been responding with a barrage of ads stressing its commitment to Québec’s economy and culture; head office in Québec since 1880, $20MM spent in 2011 alone in cultural sponsorships and partnerships, 46 of its senior execs live and work in Québec, etc.

Bell also claims it has committed to spending $20MM to support mental health initiatives.

All this is meant to shape public opinion in Québec.

The ‘coup de grâce’ has to be this week’s announcement of a Bell and Cirque du Soleil partnership to form a new entity that will create and distribute multimedia content for television, cinema and digital platforms.

According to Bell, the partnership is unrelated to the planned acquisition of Astral but is consistent with its spirit. Daniel Lamarre, head of Le Cirque du Soleil was quoted in La Presse saying that ‘just like the merger of Astral and Bell, this commitment to invest in content and job creation in Québec will be beneficial not only for consumers but for Québec’s creative and media sectors in general”. (The translation is mine.)

Quebeckers’ beloved Cirque du Soleil is not only taking sides but getting in bed with Bell. If that doesn’t do it for Bell. I don’t know what will.

- For more on this, read Steve Faguy's blog post.

Déjà vu all over again?

Paul Hanley writes in the Saskatoon Star Phoenix that “consumer culture saturates kids’ lives” and quotes Susan Linn of the Campaign for Commercial-Free Childhood:

"The ability to play creatively is central to the human capacity to experiment, to act rather than react, and to differentiate oneself from the environment. It is how children wrestle with life and make it meaningful. Spirituality and advances in science and art are all rooted in play. Play promotes attributes essential to a democratic populace, such as curiosity, reasoning, empathy, sharing, co-operation, and a sense of competence -- a belief that the individual can make a difference in the world. Constructive problem-solving, divergent thinking, and the capacity for self-regulation are all developed through creative play.”

Hanley adds “this type of free play is being eroded in our commercialized, consumer culture. One international survey found that only 27 per cent of children currently engage in imaginative play, running around outside, playing dress-up, building forts. What do they do instead? Watch TV, play video games, surf the Net. Spending 40 hours a week in front of a screen is not unusual, it's typical.”

As is often the case in articles adopting this point of view, Québec is mentioned as having the most stringent rules in the world about marketing to children.

I’m personally in favour of ensuring kids get more free play and less screen time. But I’m less inclined to believe those who claim that new media is corrupting our children.

Here’s an historical look at what some have said about the corruptors of the past (from an article by Tom Standage entitled The Culture War published in the April 2006 issue of Wired Magazine)

Novels

"The free access which many young people have to romances, novels, and plays has poisoned the mind and corrupted the morals of many a promising youth; and prevented others from improving their minds in useful knowledge. Parents take care to feed their children with wholesome diet; and yet how unconcerned about the provision for the mind, whether they are furnished with salutary food, or with trash, chaff, or poison?"
- Reverend Enos Hitchcock, Memoirs of the Bloomsgrove Family, 1790

The Waltz

"The indecent foreign dance called the Waltz was introduced ... at the English Court on Friday last ... It is quite sufficient to cast one's eyes on the voluptuous intertwining of the limbs, and close compressure of the bodies ... to see that it is far indeed removed from the modest reserve which has hitherto been considered distinctive of English females. So long as this obscene display was confined to prostitutes and adulteresses, we did not think it deserving of notice; but now that it is ... forced on the respectable classes of society by the evil example of their superiors, we feel it a duty to warn every parent against exposing his daughter to so fatal a contagion." 
- The Times of London, 1816

Movies

"This new form of entertainment has gone far to blast maidenhood ... Depraved adults with candies and pennies beguile children with the inevitable result. The Society has prosecuted many for leading girls astray through these picture shows, but GOD alone knows how many are leading dissolute lives begun at the 'moving pictures.'" 
- The Annual Report of the New York Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children, 1909

The Telephone

"Does the telephone make men more active or more lazy? Does [it] break up home life and the old practice of visiting friends?" 
- Survey conducted by the Knights of Columbus Adult Education Committee, San Francisco Bay Area, 1926

Comic Books

"Many adults think that the crimes described in comic books are so far removed from the child's life that for children they are merely something imaginative or fantastic. But we have found this to be a great error. Comic books and life are connected. A bank robbery is easily translated into the rifling of a candy store. Delinquencies formerly restricted to adults are increasingly committed by young people and children ... All child drug addicts, and all children drawn into the narcotics traffic as messengers, with whom we have had contact, were inveterate comic-book readers This kind of thing is not good mental nourishment for children!" 
- Fredric Wertham, Seduction of the Innocent, 1954

Rock and Roll

"The effect of rock and roll on young people, is to turn them into devil worshippers; to stimulate self-expression through sex; to provoke lawlessness; impair nervous stability and destroy the sanctity of marriage. It is an evil influence on the youth of our country." 
- Minister Albert Carter, 1956

Videogames

"The disturbing material in Grand Theft Auto and other games like it is stealing the innocence of our children and it's making the difficult job of being a parent even harder ... I believe that the ability of our children to access pornographic and outrageously violent material on video games rated for adults is spiraling out of control."
- US senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, 2005