Justin Trudeau’s sunny ways won in 2015. Can his brand survive

Trudeau was the ideal candidate for dark times when he was elected. But even as he gains popularity for opposing Trump, Brand Trudeau looks vulnerable.
President Donald Trump had already vamoosed early from the G7 summit in early June when Prime Minister Justin Trudeau stepped in front of a “Charlevoix” backdrop emblazoned with the silhouettes of an unmistakably Canadian Shield forest.
It would be “with regret, but it would be with absolute certainty and firmness” that Canada would soon enact retaliatory tariffs, Trudeau confirmed, in response to the trade war Trump seemed determined to launch. “I have made it very clear to the president that it is not something we relish doing, but it is absolutely something we will do,” Trudeau said, with a slight shrug, in the manner of a parent simply laying out the consequences for a mid-tantrum child. “Because Canadians, we’re polite, we’re reasonable, but we also will not be pushed around.” That last line started out with a lopsided grin and the earnest tone Trudeau often adopts when making statements about the nature of the country he leads, but it ended up somewhere just shy of “Just watch me.” Philippe Garneau, president of GWP Brand Engineering, looked at this moment as an advertising guy and thought, “This is great, the character did something!” To Garneau, the moment contained just the right amount of emotion. “It wasn’t dramatic or histrionic, it was very calm,” says Garneau, who is the brother of Trudeau’s minister of transport, Marc Garneau. “If I was part of his team, I would say, ‘How do we get him to do more of that?’ ”
Trudeau and his Liberal party swept to power in 2015 during a political moment that was perfect for the sunny ways they touted and the savvy way they used social media and political branding to broadcast those ways, and the youthful, telegenic leader who embodied them. Voters had tired of the dour, workmanlike character of Harper’s Conservative government. Life at large seemed buoyant, and the self-conscious optimism and progressiveness of Trudeau & Co. were perfectly poised to catch the updraft. For months, there was a frisson of novelty around everything they did—even if you were inclined to wonder if all those photobombs were strictly necessary.
Source: macleans.ca