It’s springtime in Metro Vancouver, when thickets of selfie sticks and tourists sprout beneath canopies of the region’s famous cherry blossoms.
On Sussex Avenue in Burnaby, east of Vancouver, a group of five fashionably dressed women set up an iPhone on a tripod under the blossoms.
One accessorizes with a green scarf then pauses to give instructions to her friends, adjusting their angles, just so, for the perfect shot. They’re too busy to talk, as they strike a series of poses, hands on hips.
A woman poses as another takes her photograph with a phone under a cherry blossom tree in Vancouver on Tuesday. The Vancouver Cherry Blossom Festival runs until April 23. (Darryl Dyck/The Canadian Press)
Such scenes are familiar for Linda Poole, founder and creative director of the Vancouver Cherry Blossom Festival, which runs from April 1 to 23.
She recalls the sight of tourists getting out of a tour bus at Queen Elizabeth Park, one of Vancouver’s most popular locations for blossom viewing.
“And they are literally dancing under the blossoms and singing and modelling and posing. It’s really cute. I see that all the time,” said Poole.
Iryna Prykhodko, right, poses in the middle of the street as Yuliia Turbina takes photographs of her under a canopy of cherry blossom trees. (Darryl Dyck/The Canadian Press)
Vancouver’s cherry blossoms have become a domestic and international tourist draw, with Chinese tour companies offering flower viewing packages for thousands of dollars, competing with more traditional locations such as Tokyo and Kyoto in Japan.
Edward Xie, manager of Richmond, B.C., travel agency First Express Travel, said his company advertises Vancouver flower viewing in international markets.
He said guides pick up travellers from China and the U.S. at the airport and drive them around the city’s best cherry blossom locations.
While cities like Kyoto and Washington, D.C. might be more popular for cherry blossoms, Vancouver’s culinary scene gives it an edge, according to one tourism expert. (Darryl Dyck/The Canadian Press)
An eight-day, seven-night trip from China to Vancouver and Victoria promoted by First Express is dubbed the “two cities flower viewing” tour and costs 33,603 yuan, or $6,580.
“Walk into a colourful world to enjoy flowers, watch whales and roam freely outdoors. Experience the romance brought by pink cherry blossoms and feel the vibe of April on Canada’s West Coast,” reads the advertisement.
Vancouver’s blossoms have become renowned in East Asia, where the city’s trees have their origin. The Vancouver Cherry Blossom Festival includes a walking tour of the blossoms through the Kitsilano neighbourhood in Mandarin. Like the English-language tours, it’s fully booked.
Poole said that in the 1930s, the mayors of the Japanese cities of Yokohama and Kobe gave 500 cherry trees to the Vancouver Park Board to honour Japanese Canadians who served in the First World War.
Now, Destination Vancouver says there are more than 40,000 cherry trees in the city.
Discover the Japanese roots of Vancouver’s cherry blossoms
They’re more than just a pretty photo backdrop. Did you know that many of the cherry trees in Vancouver have a direct connection to Japan?
Charlene Liu, president and CEO of Panasia Holidays, a Calgary-based tourism company, said cherry blossom viewing is extremely popular among Chinese-speaking domestic tourists, many of them from Edmonton and Calgary.
“For them, it’s like a perfect combination to gaze upon the cherry blossoms while exploring the local culinary scene since Vancouver is also famous for food,” said Liu in an interview conducted in Mandarin.
Cities like Kyoto and Washington, D.C., might have bigger international reputations, but Xie said many blossom tourists to Vancouver also have family in the city.
“Taking photos under the cherry trees is a universal thing — everyone loves it,” said Xie.
Cherry trees blooming in Vancouver, B.C., on March 30, 2022. The trees in the cities were initially a gift from Japanese mayors. (Gian Paolo Mendoza/CBC)
Some spots are favourites
It’s not just tourists drawn to the blossoms that drift down like pink snow when caught by a breeze.
Burnaby resident Emmanuel S.T. Yu, enjoying a stroll under Burnaby’s cherry blossoms with wife Connie, said the flowers reminded him it was “a blessing” to live in B.C.
“It’s my family’s annual tradition to walk around to see the cherry blossom trees and we have been keeping doing this for 11 years straight. We never get tired of it,” said Yu in Mandarin.
“The flowers always easily cheer us up, reminding us about how lucky we are to live here.”
Thousands of cherry trees are placed around Vancouver, though some places have become hotspots for photographers. (Darryl Dyck/The Canadian Press)
Jordan Liu, B.C.-based director of the tour guide training program with the Canadian Inbound Tourism Association of Asia Pacific, said there were more than 2,700 cherry blossom locations across Metro Vancouver, and the choices could be overwhelming.
But he has some favourites — Graveley Street on Vancouver’s Eastside, West 22nd Avenue in Arbutus Ridge, Nelson Street in the downtown core, Yukon Street and outside Vancouver City Hall.
On West 22nd Avenue, Sophie Chan said she travelled on multiple buses to get to the neighbourhood from her home in Surrey. The slight rise and fall of the street makes it possible to see a corridor of blooming trees stretching into the distance, and it’s a favourite location on Instagram.
Chan said the secret to a good cherry blossom photo is patience — you need to wait for the right moment, with the right light, and the right wind to bring the petals fluttering down.
Retired mechanical engineer Kenneth Kwan, 84, was standing outside his home on Sussex Avenue in Burnaby, wearing a straw hat as he greeted people taking photos of the blossoms.
He said the flowers made him feel alive after an illness confined him to hospital for more than six weeks last year.
“My friends from San Francisco will soon come to Vancouver to visit me. I will show them around the city, including the cherry blossoms in my neighbourhood,” said Kwan.
“Friends, flowers and laughter are the best.”
This story was produced with the financial assistance of the Meta-Canadian Press News Fellowship,which is not involved in the editorial process.
MONTREAL – Travel company Transat AT Inc. reported a loss in its latest quarter compared with a profit a year earlier as its revenue edged lower.
The parent company of Air Transat says it lost $39.9 million or $1.03 per diluted share in its quarter ended July 31.
The result compared with a profit of $57.3 million or $1.49 per diluted share a year earlier.
Revenue in what was the company’s third quarter totalled $736.2 million, down from $746.3 million in the same quarter last year.
On an adjusted basis, Transat says it lost $1.10 per share in its latest quarter compared with an adjusted profit of $1.10 per share a year earlier.
Transat chief executive Annick Guérard says demand for leisure travel remains healthy, as evidenced by higher traffic, but consumers are increasingly price conscious given the current economic uncertainty.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 12, 2024.
Dollarama Inc.’s food aisles may have expanded far beyond sweet treats or piles of gum by the checkout counter in recent years, but its chief executive maintains his company is “not in the grocery business,” even if it’s keeping an eye on the sector.
“It’s just one small part of our store,” Neil Rossy told analysts on a Wednesday call, where he was questioned about the company’s food merchandise and rivals playing in the same space.
“We will keep an eye on all retailers — like all retailers keep an eye on us — to make sure that we’re competitive and we understand what’s out there.”
Over the last decade and as consumers have more recently sought deals, Dollarama’s food merchandise has expanded to include bread and pantry staples like cereal, rice and pasta sold at prices on par or below supermarkets.
However, the competition in the discount segment of the market Dollarama operates in intensified recently when the country’s biggest grocery chain began piloting a new ultra-discount store.
The No Name stores being tested by Loblaw Cos. Ltd. in Windsor, St. Catharines and Brockville, Ont., are billed as 20 per cent cheaper than discount retail competitors including No Frills. The grocery giant is able to offer such cost savings by relying on a smaller store footprint, fewer chilled products and a hearty range of No Name merchandise.
Though Rossy brushed off notions that his company is a supermarket challenger, grocers aren’t off his radar.
“All retailers in Canada are realistic about the fact that everyone is everyone’s competition on any given item or category,” he said.
Rossy declined to reveal how much of the chain’s sales would overlap with Loblaw or the food category, arguing the vast variety of items Dollarama sells is its strength rather than its grocery products alone.
“What makes Dollarama Dollarama is a very wide assortment of different departments that somewhat represent the old five-and-dime local convenience store,” he said.
The breadth of Dollarama’s offerings helped carry the company to a second-quarter profit of $285.9 million, up from $245.8 million in the same quarter last year as its sales rose 7.4 per cent.
The retailer said Wednesday the profit amounted to $1.02 per diluted share for the 13-week period ended July 28, up from 86 cents per diluted share a year earlier.
The period the quarter covers includes the start of summer, when Rossy said the weather was “terrible.”
“The weather got slightly better towards the end of the summer and our sales certainly increased, but not enough to make up for the season’s horrible start,” he said.
Sales totalled $1.56 billion for the quarter, up from $1.46 billion in the same quarter last year.
Comparable store sales, a key metric for retailers, increased 4.7 per cent, while the average transaction was down2.2 per cent and traffic was up seven per cent, RBC analyst Irene Nattel pointed out.
She told investors in a note that the numbers reflect “solid demand as cautious consumers focus on core consumables and everyday essentials.”
Analysts have attributed such behaviour to interest rates that have been slow to drop and high prices of key consumer goods, which are weighing on household budgets.
To cope, many Canadians have spent more time seeking deals, trading down to more affordable brands and forgoing small luxuries they would treat themselves to in better economic times.
“When people feel squeezed, they tend to shy away from discretionary, focus on the basics,” Rossy said. “When people are feeling good about their wallet, they tend to be more lax about the basics and more willing to spend on discretionary.”
The current economic situation has drawn in not just the average Canadian looking to save a buck or two, but also wealthier consumers.
“When the entire economy is feeling slightly squeezed, we get more consumers who might not have to or want to shop at a Dollarama generally or who enjoy shopping at a Dollarama but have the luxury of not having to worry about the price in some other store that they happen to be standing in that has those goods,” Rossy said.
“Well, when times are tougher, they’ll consider the extra five minutes to go to the store next door.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 11, 2024.
TORONTO – The U.S. Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has ordered TD Bank Group to pay US$28 million for repeatedly sharing inaccurate, negative information about its customers to consumer reporting companies.
The agency says TD has to pay US$7.76 million in total to tens of thousands of victims of its illegal actions, along with a US$20 million civil penalty.
It says TD shared information that contained systemic errors about credit card and bank deposit accounts to consumer reporting companies, which can include credit reports as well as screening reports for tenants and employees and other background checks.
CFPB director Rohit Chopra says in a statement that TD threatened the consumer reports of customers with fraudulent information then “barely lifted a finger to fix it,” and that regulators will need to “focus major attention” on TD Bank to change its course.
TD says in a statement it self-identified these issues and proactively worked to improve its practices, and that it is committed to delivering on its responsibilities to its customers.
The bank also faces scrutiny in the U.S. over its anti-money laundering program where it expects to pay more than US$3 billion in monetary penalties to resolve.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 11, 2024.
