The St. Lawrence Starch Company’s decision to become the title sponsor of the Dixie Bee Hive Hockey Club was a great deal more than a marriage between a local sporting team and a local company involving itself in a popular community sport. The company marketed its Bee Hive Golden Corn Syrup to the sporting community because “To play hockey you need Bee Hive for the energy source,” former President and Chairman of the Board, John Gray, said.
It has become very common in today’s sporting markets to see numerous ‘energy’ foods and drinks. All, without exception, use a natural sweetener, glucose, as the main ingredient. St. Lawrence Starch Company must surely be able to lay claim to being the first to market an energy product directly to the sports industry.
The St. Lawrence Starch Company in full production. Located on the southeast corner of Lakeshore Road and Hurontario Street, the plant was one of the region’s largest employers. Photo courtesy of John Cassan, Port Credit Harbourmaster. Certainly its marketing smarts were miles ahead of everyone else in the industry. They adopted the ‘Bee Hive’ logo and the ‘Bee’ when in fact corn syrup was their product and the more expensive honey was their competition in the market place. Everyone could afford corn syrup and no one questioned the use of the ‘Honey Bee’ and ‘Bee Hive’ as the logos to market the corn syrup.
Decades before the ‘Silver Seven’ group of businessmen even started discussing the idea of building Dixie Arena Gardens, St. Lawrence had already invested in the sport of hockey. To become involved with a Dixie team was a solid business investment. And to understand that sponsorship, all one has to do is look back St. Lawrence Starch Company’s association with the National Hockey League (NHL).