• The Big Apple
• Motor City
• Beantown
• City of Angels
• The Big Easy
• Opportunity Oasis

Who’s the odd one out here?

Most major cities in the world have a nickname or brand. They can help in establishing a civic identity, helping outsiders recognize a community or attracting people to a community. They can also promote civic pride; and build community unity. Nicknames that successfully capture a city’s “ideology or myth” are also believed to have economic value in some cases.

The Metro Phoenix Partnership for Arts and Culture has chosen ‘Opportunity Oasis’ for Phoenix on the recommendation of Arthesia, a Zurich and L.A. based consulting firm. On Tuesday I attended a public presentation of the current status of the branding strategy. In the room with the usual suits and powers that be were a few social media colleagues, including Derek Neighbors, Tyler Hurst, Francine Hardaway and Ward Andrews. We were not impressed.

The Opportunity Oasis concept is part of MPAC’s Metro Phoenix DNA strategy book (which, alas is not online, more than a year after being published can be downloaded here.)  It is based on three main ‘story ideas’: Urban Pioneers, Upscale Dessert Garden, and Open Space Thinking.  Sure, there is a certain bureaucratic appeal to the concept of Opportunity Oasis. (After all it was done by a top-notch firm paid big dollars to come up with appealing concepts): it is iterative, it rolls of the tongue, it represents optimism. The fact is, however, that it doesn’t reflect reality. Not even close. Sure marketing campaigns are aspirational, but this is stretching things too far.

What I find ironic about this strategy is that the very name Phoenix was chosen as a brand for the region well over 100 years ago. It was chosen by Darrell Duppa to reflect that Phoenix is built on the ashes of past civilizationa. This is an apt metaphor that I’ll return to later.

Here is what I think when I hear the term: Opportunity Oasis.

Opportunity. Sure it is a cheap place to do business, if low ages and cheap rent are your only concerns. This is why WalMart is our #1 employer.

Oasis: Sure the Valley was once a desert oasis. It was first settled thousands of years ago on a fertile river crescent. Alas, over the past 50 years we have done everything to forget this. (Except for our golf courses and back lawns)

So yes Phoenix is an opportunity oasis if you have don’t need talented workforce, want cheap land, don’t need to connect with others on a regular basis, and like to play golf or mow lawns.

For the rest of us, Metro Phoenix is more of an Opportunity Mirage:

• Instead of nurturing ‘Urban Pioneers’ we push aside those who have worked tirelessly on their business in favor of flashy new developers. We tell people with new ideas that they haven’t been here long enough to understand; we ignore worldviews that fall outside their engrained ways (ways that have led Phoenix into a constant boom and bust cycles.)

• Instead of preserving our ‘Upscale Urban Garden,’ we bulldoze over the desert and replace it with red tiles roofs. We build McMansions up the side of our mountains. We turn our back on to our water sources (or make ‘fake lakes’ to entice developers.). We tear down historical building and put up Parking lot (apologies to Joni Mitchell)

• Instead of promoting ‘Open Desert Thinking,’ we under fund our education system. We subsidize sprawl making it difficult to connect people with ideas. We let the Mormon Church and others of the ‘righteous right’ enforce their narrow social views on the rest of us.

Perhaps worst of all, we turn our backs on the very opportunities we seek. We are so amounted by attracting the shiny new firm, or any outsider for that matter, that we ignore the businesses that are growing under our nose.

The Way Out

Phoenix doesn’t need another marketing campaign or branding effort. We need live up to our name and rise from the ashes of our past bad decisions. Here some starting points:

• Stop trying to lure the big fish. They don’t stick around for long (remember Google?) Low costs, government incentives and marketing campaigns are only a small part of the equation. Without focusing on the big things like talent and community, we are just creating a revolving door for business looking to exploit what we offer.

• Stop the zero sum game of luring developers to build yet another retail epicenter to one Valley or another to enhance retail taxes takes. Instead look at ways to diversify our economy so we are not continually hit by real estate meltdowns. The current crisis was not the first, and won’t be the last. Instead of waiting for the cycle to start again, we need to find another cycle.

• Focus on getting the fundamentals right. Re-think and re-balance our state tax system to be less dependent on high corporate taxes, even if it means individuals and property owners pay a bit more. Make sure that we offer a solid education system and natural and cultural offerings.  Invest in multi-modal transit to weave stronger connections between the various hubs in the Valley. This will make it easier for people AND their ideas to connect. THESE are what attract talented people and innovative businesses.

MPAC has it backwards: they came up with a marketing campaign first and are acting second. While the MPAC report admits that Phoenix has its flaws, instead of endeavoring to correct them, they want to gloss them over with flashy magazines, yet another website and faux ‘viral’ video competition, and the now requisite iPhone app (that still isn’t quite ready…) We’re told that this is the first part of a long, multi-year process. I suggest that they go back and reevaluate their strategy and help Metro Phoenix get the fundamentals right first. Otherwise their Opportunity Oasis will be seen, not as an authentic expression of what the Valley represents, but as an Opportunity Mirage solely designed to attract the latest business looking for concessions.

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Post Script 1: To their credit,  Amy Heisler from MPAC has agreed to sit down and talk with me next week.  I’ll be sharing these concerns and other with her. If you have any comments or concerns to add, please leave a comment.

Post Script 2: If you are indeed going to follow through on the Opportunity Oasis strategy, be sure to get some SEO advice. Right now a Google search shows up Francine Hardaway’s critique and two development firms. Not exactly the image you want to project, whether it’s meant for public consumption or not.

This is day 17 in my 28 Day Blogging Challenge. 11 days to go.

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