Victoria’s Prince of Whales basks in global limelight
Tourism company’s name becomes trending topic after it’s mistakenly mentioned in Trump tweet after U.S. president’s U.K. visit
VICTORIA — All bow before the Prince of Whales. Or maybe toss him a salmon.
Donald Trump inadvertently turned a global spotlight on a Victoria-based tourism business last week when he mistakenly included its name in a tweet meant to refer to Prince Charles.
“I meet and talk to ‘foreign governments’ every day,” Trump wrote. “I just met with the Queen of England (U.K.), the Prince of Whales … ”
Er, that should be Prince of Wales. The Prince of Whales is a whale-watching outfit.
“The president’s misspelling turned out to be our advertising Trump card,” joked the company’s owner, Alan McGillivray. “We couldn’t pay for this kind of international attention.”
General manager Ben Duthie was also impressed. “Our Twitter has been blowing up all day today.”
Trump’s tweet was corrected and reposted to the social-media site, but too late to stem a flood of gleeful responses to his mistake. Prince of Whales, which became a trending topic on Twitter, was in more than 14,000 tweets by the time most Vancouver Islanders had risen for breakfast.
“We now go live to Donald Trump’s meeting with the Prince of Whales,” read a post that included an illustration of a whale wearing a crown.
“First photos in from Trump’s meeting with the Prince of Whales,” a person wrote, sharing a picture of a whale seemingly giving a diver a high-five.
“Wait, I thought this guy was the ‘Prince of Whales’?” a commenter posed, sharing a picture of Jason Momoa as Aquaman.
Even London’s Royal Albert Hall, a concert venue, got in on the fun. “Done a bit of work on the #PrinceofWhales room this afternoon,” the official Twitter account said, with images depicting the “renovations.” In addition to a name change, whales jumping out of the water were digitally added to hanging portraits.
The Prince of Whales got in on the action on its @Whale_ Sightings account, posting its own tweet featuring Trump juxtaposed with McGillivray: “Hmm @POTUS mentions speaking with us but we never got the call! We are looking for a Brand Ambassador to promote our company though and you’ve definitely got our attention. We’ll be in touch!”
Alas, by the end of the week, Trump hadn’t phoned.
The president’s misspelling turned out to be our advertising Trump card.
Alan McGillivray