An effort to market Prince Albert to visitors has inadvertently spawned a new trend among local residents.
Tourism Prince Albert launched their PA#SK clothing line last year with a logo design featuring a wheat sheaf between the PA and SK, with a treeline above and waves of water below.
Initially the intention was to sell the Hoodies, Sweatshirts and t-shirts to tourists as s promotional piece who would take the merchandise back home as a memento of their visit to Prince Albert. However, Tourism Prince Albert marketing and business development manager Duane Krip said the clothing has been an even bigger hit with local residents, who want to show their Prince Albert pride.
“It really started last year,” Krip said. “We noticed around Christmastime. Once it got out there into the public and local people heard about these hoodies and saw people wearing them, they started buying them at Christmas, and at Christmastime, our sales were absolutely phenomenal. We were just like ‘wow this is incredible’.
“People were buying them for friends and family that were now living in other parts of the country and giving them as Christmas presents and that’s kind of where it all started.”
Krip said the sales were beyond their expectations. Once word about the PA#SK apparel got out locally, Prince Albert residents purchased more merchandise with the PA#SK logo than visitors at a ratio of 25 to 1.
Krip said local residents wanted to proudly display their Prince Albert roots. PA#SK merchandise has made its way from Vancouver Island to Nova Scotia.
This year, Christmas sales have tripled over last year’s numbers. Krip said local residents love the logo because it encapsulates the best of what Prince Albert is about: Agriculture, forest and lakes.
“The sales just went through the roof,” he explained. “We were completely blown away with the number of sales over last year how it has taken off. Right now as we sit today, the sales are fivefold what we did last year in the same time at Christmas.”
Krip described the sales jump as amazing.
“We never anticipated that it would go to this degree and with this amount of popularity,” he said.
Krip said even t-shirts have been hot sellers, despite the cold weather. The demand has forced Tourism Prince Albert to restock several times.
“Originally we weren’t going to do those t-shirts for the Christmas season, but people who were going away for the winter to warmer climates on vacation were coming in looking for t-shirts, so we had to bring in a big order of t-shirts with a PA#SK logo on it,” Krip explained.
The popularity had led them to expand the merchandise offering to include coffee mugs, fridge magnets, frisbees, key chains and sunglasses.
“We have also expanded into other giftware, coffee mugs and coffee tumblers and fridge magnets and they are going out the door consistently,” Krip said. “I just had someone in the store here today that they were shipping them off to relatives in B.C. It’s just absolutely phenomenal how this has taken off like this.”
michael.oleksyn@paherald.sk.ca
