From DesCan President, Amanda Parker, CDP™
Dear Members,
Thank you all for your support regarding our position relative the Vancouver FIFA World Cup ’26 Poster competition.
I wanted to let you know that in response to our email and the press coverage, the City of Vancouver’s legal and procurement teams asked DesCan for a meeting so that they could better understand why contests are so detrimental to our profession.
We were able to connect with them yesterday afternoon. The City representatives started the meeting by thanking us for the cooperative and educational tone of our email. They were very concerned about being seen as “unethical” or “exploitative” and provided assurance that was contrary to their intent.
We discussed other ways to engage with the design community, and drew their attention to the previous work DesCan has done in advocating for a change in the way Canada Post works with the design community for their stamp designs.
The meeting was exceptionally open and co-operative and it was clear the City representatives are committed to understanding and ensuring that future creative work is secured using more professional practices.
While they advised that the “horse has left the stable” for this contest, it was very clear that there is a genuine desire to not to repeat this mistake again.
We concluded the call on a very positive note and all parties committed to keeping the lines of communication open from this point onwards.
I feel very hopeful that the City understands the importance of using professional designers and now sees DesCan as a helpful resource that they can reach out to proactively in the future.
If you come across a Spec Work contest in the future, please reach out to Melanie (Director@descan.ca) or our Ethics Chair, John deWolf (John_dewolf@descan.ca) for help.
Thank you for your continued trust in DesCan to advocate on behalf of Canadian Designers – we do not take this responsibility lightly.