Kim Sebrango as Director, Marketing Operations

BillyBlass

There you go. Lets see what happens. She was at Skate Canada for about a year. Is she in it for the long haul at the CCA? Some good big name sponsors at the soccer association.

Jimmy D

Very interesting.... I will not stir the pot. Congratulations to Kim

Kozmo

Was Ed A even given an interview for this position?

Eddie Arzouian

Just great, another person at the CCA with no cycling experience. What a joke.

This should be good.

No, I was not given an interview.

Eddie Arzouian

sent to CCA Directors, Provincial Associations and the sports media:

Canadian cycling blows another opportunity


Once more Canadian cycling blows another opportunity to hire somebody who knows something about cycling.

So now at the Canadian Cycling Association (CCA) both the Chief Operating Officer and the Director of Marketing Operations know almost nothing about the sport. Perfect!


The CCA now gets somebody named Kim Sebrango who has bounced from the Ottawa Rough Riders (Remember them? They did well in marketing, going bankrupt), Soccer Canada and Skate Canada.

So, instead of somebody with experience in our sport we get a professional
Sport Canada bureaucrat. Without Alfonso Gagliano and Chuck Guite those people have not fared too well.

So we lose at least another year while this new person figures out what can be merchandised in cycling and how the sport works. We have already lost three years under current CCA President Bill Kinash. BTW, Mr. Kinash June 23 was announcing his Road Racing Legacy Fund is up and running. If this sounds familiar that's because if you think back Mr. Kinash announced the same thing 14 months ago and in that time the Foundation did nothing. So this time it really is set and running, not like last time. Honest.

After a year, once the new marketing person is up to speed we can expect nothing will happen in marketing again because the person has no passion for cycling, which is now her favourite activity after skating which was her favourite activity after soccer which was her favourite activity after football. Because the person has no passion for our sport, it is only a job, nothing will happen. Things must have been going real well at Skate Canada for Ms. Sebrango to leave that and go the mess that is the CCA!

Note to Mr. Lacelle and Ms. Sebrango, you may want to fix that merchandising tab on your web site which still doesn't work after about 10 months.

In his 90-day report Mr. Lacelle was telling us he wanted to sell 5000 jerseys in 2005. By my count he has not sold any, unless to national team athletes. If that is incorrect please give us the sales. The 2005 buying season for cycling is mainly finished, as I pointed out two months ago would happen, so this benchmark is down the drain.

I'll be watching as this mess unfolds, you can be sure of that. The Canadian Cycling Association just continues to shoot itself in the foot. You would think it would be a simple thing to understand: you have a cycling association, hire someone who knows at least something about the sport. That's the way they do it all around the rest of the world.

Somebody send Kim a glossary of terms so she can begin to figure out what she's talking about.

The CCA slogan should be, "Expect little, get less".

In the odd and rare event that anybody in the sports media wants to call the CCA to discuss cycling, if I were you I would ask for Brett Stewart or Kris Westwood, they are the only ones in the office with a clue. Save yourself the trouble of getting, "Gee, I don't know, let me look that up", as an answer.

Eddie Arzouian

PS Just in case you cannot discern the pattern here.


CCA President Bill Kinash knows very little about cycling.

So he hires a Chief Operating Officer who know less than him, Steve Lacelle.

Lacelle hires a Diretor of Marketing Operations, Kim Sebrango, who knows less about cycling then him, which by now is about zero knowledge of cycling.

And there is your National Sport Governing Body.

Between the three of them they would not have enough experience to run a local cycling club but they are in charge of sport for the country.

It boggles the mind, if anybody else bothers to think about it.

Van de Wille

I thought you had massive support in high places? You might consider re-evaluating the criteria by which you call people "friends" and "allies". Just a thought...

nbf

I think that sending a sour grapes letter to the "sports media" about a person who got hired over you is incredibly distasteful. I guess that the words "gracious acceptance" never made it into your vocabulary? I also note in your message that you did not include any kind of disclaimer stating your vested interest in the hiring decision. I think that this makes the claims of bias in your past writings much more plausible.

Eddie Arzouian

Yeah, whatever, tell me about it another 18 months or so when she has quit, been fired or failed and we are back to square one.


A former Ticket Sales Director for the Ottawa Rough Riders. That's like saying you were a navigator for the Titantic!

Here's what people said about them:


Sink the ship!

The only way to save the Argos may be to fold 'em


By STEVE SIMMONS -- Toronto Sun

The Argonauts may be today's headline but, sadly, they are yesterday's news. An old team and an old story that won't seem to go away....


There was barely an argument raised when the Ottawa Rough Riders succumbed to their own ineptitude and disappeared.

"Ineptitude", Ms. Sebrango will be right at home at the current CCA.

a little extra reading:

Ottawa Rough Riders

Dowdall, Brent. Turnover: The fumbling of the Ottawa Rough Riders. Ottawa: B. Dowdall, 1999.
ISBN: 1-894439-01-5 (trade paperback) Really quite a well-researched and well-written history, focusing on the final twenty years of the Ottawa franchise, although some reasonably good overview material is given of the team from its original formation in 1876. Dowdall provides particularly good treatment of the Gliebermans and the Horn Chen fiasco. A superb illustration of the half-baked business decisions that caused the decline and collapse of the Rough Riders.

Soccer Canada, there's another great reference! Even Van de Wille himself wrote that Canadian pro soccer is in terrible trouble. He says he knows soccer so I'll give him the benefit of the doubt this time. The only place it is successful is here in Montreal.

The Canadian National Soccer Teams are so poor and disorganized they make our national cycling teams look like the Discovery Team.

That's all we need to emulate, Soccer Canada! We can hold raffles and bake sales to get the teams to Worlds.

BTW, Kim there are no cycling tournaments like in soccer, just so we are clear. I once had a Marketing and PR "expert" write us a press release that mentioned those.

PS Billy having brand names in sport doesn't mean they will pack up and leave that sport to come to cycling. I quite certtisn ww eil se Sebrnago leave befor eacomplishing anythign here. Look the shortness of stints at the other federatiosn and they are easy compared to cycling.

What we have here is another professional Sports Canada bureaucrat who shuffles from one federation to another. Those people usually fail in cycling.

nbf

What is your count based on, Ed? Curious to know what your metrics are. I've actually seen quite a few shops with them for sale out here in the West, and I've seen them in shops in Ontario, too.

Is that the kind of precise measurements we would have seen with you at the Marketing helm?

Eddie Arzouian

Let's see how truthful Van de Wille can be.

He decided to belittle the quality and level of recommedations I had for the CCA position. I wonder who in cycling would have proposed Sebrango?

I have sent him the recommendation.

So Patrick, tell us, it is a poor recommendation for somebody unknown in the sport or is it a glowing review and vindication for my claims by a guy with about 40 years cycling experience and on the CCA inside?

Remember I will most likely be posting it, since, frankly I don't give crap anymore, so be honest.

Can you do that? Be honest?

As for the jersey question. I have not seen the CDN jersey on sale in the two very good bike boutiques here. The merchandise tab on the CCA web site does not work. I find it very hard to beleive the CCA will come anywhere close to selling 5000 jerseys this year because I have sold two thousands jerseys and I know what that takes. I'd be surprise if the CCA can sell 500. They will sell more like 50. What are they selling them for in the stores you saw?

Of course, given the lack of transparency at the CCA we will probably never know the real numbers.

Van de Wille

No I didn't - what I meant was that I am not convinced that the people who say to your face that they will be recommending you are in fact doing so very energetically. I know that if I were, say, director general of a province and a committee prez at the CCA, I wouldn't be too energetic in pushing the candidacy of a guy who has spent the past two years slagging them in public after suing them - even if I were being nice to the guy after knowing him for a long time.

Oh, I don't doubt that. Confidentiality dies when it comes to Ed. Caveat emptor.

Eddie Arzouian

"Caveat emptor"? Paddy? The buyer beware?
How is that relevant?

How about caveat scriptor wouldn't that be more apropos if we are discussing writing emails and letters?

Anyway, getting back to Ms. Sebrango, the CCA Press release tells us, "She also organized over 125 international “A” level matches "

Isn't that great! If the Canadian CYCLING Association ever wants to hold a soccer tournament they have their man.

I was looking through their release for the number of cycling events she has organized but it wasn't mentioned.

Do you think that number would be zero?

Then it is the same as the CCA Chief Operating Officer when he was hired.

Do you think Ms. Sebrango has even ATTENDED a cycling race before?

I suppose we will never know.

Uboat

Maybe he just means that you post everyone's emails here, with or without their permission, I am guessing is what he is driving at. I'd say that's fairly relevant if you are trying to get people to trust you or ally themselves with you.