Over a snarl of commuter traffic, billboards have appeared around Toronto with messages crafted to tug at the frustrations of city dwellers.
“You could be home by now,” reads one billboard in the downtown core, accompanied by the image of a playful family.
These billboards, along with a “Don’t Tell Toronto” social media campaign, are part of a renewed “tongue-in-cheek” marketing push by the London Economic Development Corp. (LEDC), a non-profit funded by the City of London, to lure Toronto workers and families to London, Ont. Similar to the advertisements funded by the government of Alberta in 2022 that touted affordable housing and employment opportunities out west, this campaign has taken aim at the high cost and limited space that is synonymous with life in the GTA.
Kapil Lakhotia, president of the LEDC, says these “edgy” messages have resonated. More than 5,000 people have reached out to the company over email to inquire about job opportunities in the London area since the renewed campaign efforts launched on Labour Day.
“By all measures, the campaign seems to have struck a chord with people who might be open for looking at alternative locations and a diverse range of opportunities,” he said.
Marketing efforts to attract new residents to London from Toronto and the U.S. began in 2021, Lakhotia said, in response to a labour shortage in London and capitalizing on a rising number of families looking to live outside of larger cities in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. The latest advertising campaign is focused largely on attracting workers within health-care and life sciences industries to fill job vacancies.
Karen Chapple, the director of the School of Cities at the University of Toronto, said it’s unsurprising that recruiters from Alberta and London would focus on housing affordability in their recruitment pitches.
“It’s a smart tactic, because I think that’s the biggest pain point for households right now,” she said.
Affordability is a rising concern for Ontario residents — particularly new graduates, 40 per cent of whom are considering leaving the province, according to survey data from the Ontario Real Estate Association. Mike Moffatt, assistant professor at Western University’s Ivey Business School, previously told the Star advertisements like the “Alberta is Calling” campaign have proved successful in attracting young workers elsewhere — something that could take an economic toll on Toronto.
U of T’s Chapple said a “brain drain” of highly trained young professionals leaving the city has already begun. Small and mid-sized cities offer far more affordability than even Toronto’s suburbs, she said, which can be appealing to those who can find jobs in these regions or are able to work remotely. In her own circles, she knows several households who moved to London due to affordability concerns.
As people move away, Chapple said this space in the city’s labour market will likely be filled by new immigrants.
“It’s not the end of Toronto’s economy, by far,” she said. “Actually having some people leave can help Toronto accommodate the global demand for this city.”
Jesse Helmer, a senior research associate for the Smart Prosperity Institute research group and think tank, says that labour market vacancies in the wake of the pandemic within communities across Canada have set off a “war for talent,” leaving some regions little choice but to try and poach workers from larger cities. The LEDC is a client of Smart Prosperity, although Helmer is not involved with the “Don’t Tell Toronto” advertising campaign and it predates his work with the corporation.
London’s population was already on the rise prior to these recent efforts, according to Statistics Canada census data from 2021. The population grew 10 per cent between 2016 and 2021 — due largely to immigration and interprovincial migration, demographers say.
Because of the rapid growth of young families, Helmer says London’s primary and secondary schools have been “overflowing,” with portables needed to accommodate the number of students enrolled.
Overall, Helmer said all cities should focus on increasing their supply of affordable, sustainable housing so that people can have a good quality of life wherever they choose to live.
“That’s probably a sign of just how bad things have gotten is that we’re seeing advertising campaigns trying to pull people out of these really expensive cities,” said Helmer. “I think as much as we’re putting money into marketing, we probably really need to focus on the housing side, too.”
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