You Can Do That Here

Collaboration, cooperation and celebration. You might say they are the three C’s of how to sell most any product, especially beer,

Find the right partners to work with supplying your business, and distributing your product., cooperate on sales and marketing efforts with key partners, and throw a good party where people can enjoy and consume your product. Of course there is one more point to add to that list. Make a good, quality product that sells itself.

The Nelson Brewing Company has been figuring out that formula for 25 years. While craft brewing is all the rage and a major growth industry around the world, in the early 90’s when NBC set up shop in the West Kootenays, they were pioneering a new trend in the region. To sell their beer they first had to educate the market that their “hippy beer,” was just as good as the big brands. Then they found their niche making organic beer, and finally they embedded themselves deeply into the community’s culture, character and lifestyle.

The end result is a bursting at the seams brewery, scrambling to continue its production expansion to keep up with growing demand from a growing geographical area, all while at the same time staying true to their Nelson roots and taking care of home first.

I sat down with Chad Hansen at the NBC brewery to hear their backstory, and their universal lesson on how to sell and market any product.

So you’ve got an idea for the next big business.

 The downside? You don’t have very many potential customers around in your small town.

The dilemma? You love your small town and the small town lifestyle and wouldn’t want to move to a major center.

The question?  Can you launch and grow a small business from your small town. If the previous 75 episodes are any indication the answer is of course you can.

 Getting your product or service (especially in the early days) out to a wider global audience can seem like a daunting task. Can a big business launch, grow and stay in small town once they have made it big? Is living in a small market a major disadvantage to making it?

 This episode is the first with our newest supporter. We’re excited to have two of their awesome previous clients Mary Racine of Handy Hay Nets and Charlotte Ferreux of Thrive Consulting with us for the first episode.

Idle. Webster’s defines it as being not active, as well as being without purpose. Many folks could well say that being idle is one of the leading causes of the climate change challenge we all face together. Whether it’s  governments failing to take action fast enough, corporations not stepping up to improve their environmental game, or just everyday people sitting idle, not being active, or finding their purpose on how they can assist in the efforts.

Most all of us have ideas, big or small on what could be done to help protect the air we breathe, water we drink, land we live on and plants, animals and humans we live with, but few of us actually find our purpose and take action.

Kim Klassen is not among that group. This week’s Sustainability Action Hero has identified one purpose that she has gotten active on, and has taken her idea and put it into action. Not sitting idle on the issue of idling cars and trucks in Rossland, Kim has already achieved success on the first steps of her current purpose with more to come. Here what she’s up to, how she’s taken her ideas and put them into action and how you can too.

Snakes and Ladders. The business world can often feel like and adult version of the popular game, especially when trying to invent a brand new product. For every two steps forward there are often one or more steps backward to follow. Just when you think you’re on the right path, another emerges. Yes it’s really all just a big game of choose your own adventure really. By setting out a clear end goal, having enough perseverance, a belief that your idea is indeed a winner, and the confidence that you will get it to the end line whatever it takes with perhaps a little bit of luck sprinkled in, you might just luck out and get more ladders than snakes.

Rob Barden is nearing the end of his version of the game with the finish line in site.  We last spoke to Rob back in episode 30 in March 2015, just over a year ago. At that time, the former photocopier tycoon from the prairies was just embarking on his journey. The goal: invent a remotely releasable ski binding to keep skiers safer, and get it into the market.

I sat down with Rob at the KAST office in Rossland, to hear how things have gone since, and how he’s almost completed the task of taking an idea to real product, to the market. If this episode teaches us anything however, there may just be a few more snakes and ladders before they get there officially.

Climate Change. Most likely the biggest threat to mankind in our short history on the planet. The technology and ability to avoid and reduce its impact has been around for decades. What has been missing is a broad agreement on the true impact of mankind on climate change, and getting broad buy in on global level to do something about it.

Imagine future where any disagreement on the subject would be impossible. Imagine a future where mankind’s impact on climate change could be measured accurately around the globe?

 Pilar Portela and Bryan Fry o Rossland, BC have combined their talents to make this happen and take it a big step further. Combining her Enterprise Resource Planning software development and Bryan’s Internet of Things and  mass data storage experience, they intend to measure all of the emissions data on earth using big data, paint a clear picture of the image, and offer in depth analytics on solutions.

No big deal right? Just a couple of Kootenay entrepreneurs combining talents to save the world through Big Data.

Fun. If there is one truism across humankind, it is that we all love to have fun. Yes, if you can take a seemingly mundane activity, or even a potentially undesirable one, and turn it into game, the chances of people participating in that activity goes up dramatically.  While gamification may be the buzz word of the twenty teens, the simple act of getting people to do a certain behavior by turning it into a fun game has been around for ages.
 
Another common aspect of human psychology that generally applies across the board is that people love recognition. We love that pat on the back when we do a good job, that special treat for good behavior, the bonus at work for top performance, and that general feeling of achieving something and being rewarded for it.
 
A more modern day commonality shared by the now billions of technology users, is that in general, we hate to see ads. We hate to be interrupted while playing our favourite app or taking in our favourite digital content. We hate it so much, that we'll happily pay money to not have to see those ads. This presents an enormous conundrum for the online industry which has been largely funded by ad revenue, now has a major and growing user base that doesn't want to have to see ads.
 
Like any entrepreneur, Brian Wong, originally of Vancouver knew there had to be a better way. He combined these three insights to develop a brand new way to deliver ads that makes them fun, rewards people, and actually makes people want to see and participate in online ads.
 
I sat down with Brian at the BC Tech Summit in Vancouver to hear his fascinating tale.

Human Resources. What do you think of when you hear those two words? What role does it play in your company’s success? Is it merely an administration aspect of your company that you pay attention too when you need new staff and talent for your venture, that then gets put back in a box until someone needs to be hired or fired? Perhaps in days gone by, this may have been the case, but over the last decade in particular there has been a major shift in thinking around just what HR's purpose is. 

Let's stop and think for a minute. People, we know, are the lifeblood, the heart and the soul of any company.  For what is arguably the most important part of your venture, why so often dos HR take a backseat in the growth and development of our businesses?

 Agata Zasada knows this better than many. She has lead major scale-ups for the Olympic Broadcasting Corporation, Lululemon, and most recently for BC's own Hootsuite.  Truly leading edge, progressive companies like Lululemon and Hootsuite know that to be successful, the modern day HR department should be at the forefront of your company’s core. Yes to be truly successful, you need a strong and clear company culture that not just aligns with your business goals, hiring practices and strategies but one that drives all of those forward.

 I sat down with Agata at the inaugural BC Tech Summit in Vancouver to learn how we can all find, retain and keep the right people we need by letting HR drive of strategy forward.

What is it you are meant to do? If a stranger walked up to you on the street and asked you what your purpose in life is, would it match what you’re currently doing?

Whether from a mentor, friend, colleague or conference presentation, we’ve all heard it a million times over, “Do what you love, and success will follow,” but just how do we find out what it is we love, and what we were meant to do with our lives and careers? If you’re one of the lucky ones, you may already know. If not, a tried and tested route to get there is simple trial and error. Every failure is a step towards ultimate success. 

Sometimes, as En Vogue in the 90’s would have us believe, we have to just step out of the stream of life, free our minds, and the rest will follow.

For Lindsay Smith, CEO of Massive Media, it was a combination of both. Having already achieve career success in the software game, launched and run the influential Tech Vibes series while climbing the tech industry ladder it was a failure that caused her to reflect, listen to her inner voice and relaunch her career of making the world a more harmonious place through technology that she found her true calling. 

I sat down with Lindsay at the first inaugural BC Tech Summit in Vancouver to hear her inspiring tale.

Summits. They are that small point of land where all upward sloping things eventually converge together, look down and realize they’ve created a mountain together. They are a convergence of talents coming from vastly different places, moving in opposite directions that meet to form something amazing. Whether ridgelines, and alpine bowls, or founder, funder and first adopter coming together, when you put the right pieces together in the same place, great things are formed.

We took the podcast on a field trip this week, and got to experience a full emersion education in the world of tech business at the first BC Tech Summit event held in Vancouver. Not entirely sure what to expect, I felt like I was living an episode of HBO’s Silicon Valley, and quickly got caught up in the hype. Being surrounded by literally thousands of ides, start-ups and businesses “making the world a better place and thinking that expands beyond earth, and even transcends time and humanity itself, is inspiring to say the least

Pain Points. They are those areas of every business where a problem or challenge exists that is preventing or slowing down that business from getting where it wants to be. Yes pain points are in effect the very genesis of every good entrepreneurial idea. If there is a pain point, there is always a better way. If you can find that point, and come up with a solution that solves it, you're well on your way to a successful enterprise. Finding that point can be a challenge. Learning how can be the greatest tool any entrepreneur could ever ask for.

You can come up with a great idea on your own that you may believe is the most fantastic thing since sliced bread, but if it's solving a problem that the customer isn't concerned about, it's likely going nowhere, and you may well have wasted many hours and dollars coming up with a solution that no one really wants. On the flip side, if you go to your customer first and ask them what their biggest challenge is, and then go and solve it for them, you've got a customer ready and waiting to buy your product the moment your it comes off the shelf.

Mike Hambalek of Cranbrook, BC has figured out and mastered this art. With a host of patents and products under his belt already, his most recent venture solves a problem with a huge market, that also happens to be environmentally friendly, cost saving, and headache reducing. I connected with Mike to learn just what he's up to, how he figured out and uses this process, and what he's up to next.