When Petro-Canada unveiled its patriotic logo
Company retained red-and-white colour scheme of Pacific 66 stations it displaced
When the logo of the Canadian-owned oil company was unveiled in 1980, it was compared to an iconic hockey jersey.
"It looks a little like the sweaters Team Canada used to wear," said CBC reporter Mark Sikstrom, referring to the uniform Team Canada wore in the 1972 Summit Series.
A burst of energy
The image, "a white maple leaf thrusting like an energy burst into a field of red," would soon be seen at 420 Petro-Canada gas stations across Western Canada.
Petro-Canada, the government-owned oil company established by an act of Parliament in 1975, had bought Pacific Petroleums in 1978, and its Pacific 66 chain of gas stations.
Under the terms of the deal, Petro-Canada took over the branding of the gas stations — whose colours had also been red and white — two years later.
"The state oil company has high hopes the symbol will appeal to people's sense of patriotism," said Sikstrom.
'It will be a Canadian outfit'
"What we expect with this reidentification program is that the public will flock to our stations in such large numbers that we won't have to do very much extensive advertising," said a Petro-Canada spokesman at the unveiling.
A Calgary Pacific 66 dealer said he liked the new look.
"I think it will do my business some good," said the man, standing next to a gas pump. "I can see people being more involved in it because they are Canadians and it will be a Canadian outfit."
Both the pump and the man's jacket were in the red-and-white colour scheme of both Pacific 66 and Petro-Canada.
At the time there were no Petro-Canada stations east of Thunder Bay, but Sikstrom said the company hoped to expand.
Less than a year later, it did — by buying the assets of another oil company, Petrofina. Those stations, in Eastern Canada, were rebranded in October 1981.
'I wouldn't buy none of that'
By February 1981, sales at Petro-Canada stations were up 12 per cent in Western Canada, according to CBC reporter Don Newman.
But Emil Wallewein, who operated a Petro-Canada gas station south of Brooks, Alta., had the opposite experience because of some of his customers.
"They tell us point-blank, 'I wouldn't buy none of that,'" he said.
His customers, many of them transporting oil drilling equipment down the highway to the United States, were unhappy with the government's National Energy Program and apparently conflating it with Petro-Canada.
Petro-Canada stations were among the many targets of a boycott organized by the United West Association in Brooks.
"I've never bought gas knowingly at a Petro-Can station myself," said organizer Russ Turgeon. "Nor will I."
Wallewein said he didn't like it either, but he had become a victim of Ottawa's energy policy.
"It's not fair to me," he said. "You're not hurting Pierre Trudeau, you're hurting me."
Petro-Canada and Campaign '79
Petro-Canada had been an issue in the 1979 election campaign, with each party leader staking out a position on it.
"We created it ... because we thought it important that the Canadian government have a little piece of the action on behalf of the Canadian people," said Liberal Leader Pierre Trudeau in a speech.
He cited the worldwide oil crisis of 1973 as the inspiration for Petro-Canada.
But Joe Clark of the Progressive Conservatives didn't think the Canadian government needed its own company to support domestic oil and gas exploration.
What oil companies do
If his party won, he said, it would sell off Petro-Canada to private interests.
"We think a privately owned Canadian company is going to have much more success in doing the things oil companies are supposed to do — that is, find oil — than Petro-Can has," he said.
Ed Broadbent and the NDP fully supported Petro-Canada, but thought it should have an even wider mandate.
"Petro-Canada should be the exclusive importer of all oil into Canada, so we're not held up for ransom by the multi-nationals!" he said to a supportive crowd.
Clark won the election, but barely managed to effect changes to Petro-Canada before his government was defeated later that year.
