The Bradenton Area Convention and Visitors Bureau released a statement including a rather lackluster apology for offending Tampa Bay Lightning fans for their support of the Penguins.
If you are a Tampa Bay Lightning fan who was anywhere near a computer last night as the Tampa Bay Lightning took on the Pittsburgh Penguins in Game 1 of the Eastern Conference Final at the Consol Energy Center in Pittsburgh on Friday night, there is no doubt you heard something about what some would consider a betrayal of the City of Bradenton.
For those of you who aren’t aware of the situation, allow us to paint a picture for you. Dan Lucas, who is a Sports Anchor for WFLA here in Tampa Bay, tweeted out a picture of the rally towels that were being handed out in Pittsburgh for Game 1. As you can imagine, it was a yellow towel with black lettering on it with the words “Let’s Go Pens” in large letters.
Where things start to get a little dicey. When you take a glimpse at the bottom of the towels, it seems as if they were courtesy of the Bradenton, Anna Maria Island, and Longboat Key. As you can imagine, this did not go over well with Tampa Bay Lightning fans.
It was a matter of moments after the news broke that fans began to take to Twitter to show their utter disgust causing the hashtag #BoycottBradenton to start trending.
Well, it seems as if quite a bit of the negative backlash has finally landed on the doorstep of the Bradenton Area Convention and Visitors Bureau. This has caused them to release what many consider a lackluster apology to all the “Lighting” (yes, they even misspelled Lightning) fans they may have upset with their marketing campaign.
Here is the official statement from the Bradenton Arena Convention and Visitors Bureau:
"“Together, the Bradenton Area Convention and Visitors Bureau, and the Greater Bradenton Area, are a community who loves and supports the Tampa Bay Lightning. We apologize to those within the Lighting fan base who are offended and angered by our recent promotion with the Pittsburgh Penguins. We have, and always will support the Lightning.As the agency responsible for promoting tourism of our beautiful destination, we are always looking for new ways to showcase the Bradenton area.By no means do our marketing tactics represent the people of Bradenton, but rather, they represent our organization’s objective to continually drive visitors to our area to enjoy and invest in our community.We have been a proud sponsor and marketing partner of the Tampa Bay Lightning for the last two years, investing more than three times the amount we have invested in our marketing initiatives with the Penguins.We deeply respect and admire the passion Florida sports fans have for their home team, and our organization remains committed to reciprocating that passion not only for our area’s sports franchises, but for the community that we serve. We look forward to cheering on the Lightning throughout the remainder of the Stanley Cup Playoffs and beyond.#bradentonlovesthebolts”"
The Bureau claims the move was nothing more than a marketing campaign to attempt to bring new tourists to what is actually a rather beautiful area of town. While we respect they were attempting to do what they thought was right to encourage more people to visit their area.
However, when your hometown team has overcome as much as the Tampa Bay Lightning have been forced to overcome this season and are doing everything they can to make a repeat performance in the Stanley Cup Finals, what kind of organization decides to do their marketing with the opponents? There are plenty of Pittsburgh fans who live right here in Tampa Bay? Why not offer those towels in Game 3 at the Amalie Arena?
We’re not insinuating this was some sort of diabolical plan to start a war with the hometown fans, but no matter what their intentions were, it was a pretty crappy move that just looks plain bad on the area as a whole. It does nothing more than adding fuel to an already burning fire between these two rivals.
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While there will be some people who will gladly accept Bradenton’s apology and move on with their lives, there are going to be more than a few who will be flying their #BoycottBradenton flags for quite some time.