The Open People Network was founded by Jeffery Potvin in 2016.
It is a group of like-minded entrepreneurs, venture capitalists, and professionals with a desire to mentor, advise and provide practical, technical and tactical training and leadership to help set up future entrepreneurs and their businesses for success.
Transcript
00:00
well jade just like we do in this
00:02
fashion we just like to jump right in
00:03
and uh and
00:04
just kind of keep going right so i want
00:07
to thank you for
00:07
joining us pretty excited to chat with
00:10
you today because
00:11
so much of what you guys are doing in in
00:13
the alberta space is really kind of
00:16
how the rest of the world really needs
00:17
to look at how to work with
00:19
and engage with startups in that early
00:20
community and it really
00:22
uh sits home with us well because these
00:24
are the types of things that we’re
00:26
working on
00:26
so maybe to start off we can get you to
00:29
give us a little bit more of a
00:30
background
00:32
from your uh beginnings where you came
00:34
from what you’ve been up to what you’re
00:35
doing today
00:36
and then kind of looking at where you’re
00:37
going and then if you can share one
00:39
thing about you that nobody would know
00:43
well a good question and uh and i really
00:46
excited to be here jeffrey thanks for
00:48
having me and um
00:49
i mean you know we connected via
00:51
linkedin and i think you and i are both
00:53
kind of
00:54
uh social media networking typhoons so
00:57
i’m glad we were able to connect and and
00:59
and i agree with you and
01:01
i guess uh i i always tell people i’m
01:03
just a small town cool guy that kind of
01:05
uh
01:06
i don’t even know how i got here and my
01:07
journey is all over the map but
01:10
um i was always in sales and i was
01:12
always a really good sales rep and i had
01:13
a chance to become an entrepreneur
01:15
15 or so years ago with my partners um
01:18
we purchased the rights to nathan’s
01:20
famous hot dogs in canada grew it to a
01:22
brand
01:23
um exited it and since then i’ve been
01:25
helping small businesses grow scale and
01:27
exit through a purpose before profit
01:29
mode
01:30
that really focuses on companies scaling
01:32
growing
01:33
exiting but not focusing on how much
01:36
they have to pay you so we really
01:38
believe in that purpose before profit
01:40
and um and then and again it it
01:44
it’s it really hits close to home and
01:46
i’ve seen too many people getting
01:48
taken advantage of so that that is
01:50
something that we’re really passionate
01:51
about
01:52
and and uh and it is working here in the
01:55
alberta ecosystem
01:56
and i guess the one thing
02:00
uh that people really don’t know about
02:01
me is i’ve swam escape from alcatraz
02:06
say that again i swam escape from
02:09
alcatraz yeah i jump in jump in
02:11
swim around the island come on back
02:12
didn’t get eaten by a great white so
02:14
i’m here to tell the story still so you
02:17
swam around the island you didn’t
02:18
actually swim
02:19
to the mainland from there did you you
02:22
there’s two way two
02:23
uh you had one you jump off at the
02:25
island and then you swim back and the
02:27
other one is where you go
02:28
start and go around and then finish back
02:30
on land so
02:32
okay so how did it that sounds pretty
02:34
exciting i need to explore this i
02:36
haven’t been to the alcatraz but my
02:37
brother did go and
02:39
found it pretty fascinating i had no
02:41
idea you could swim from alcatraz
02:43
i guess back to mainland is that the
02:45
idea yeah yeah i mean it was uh
02:48
actually it was like all good ideas it
02:50
started with a few uh few whiskies and
02:52
uh
02:53
we ended up having to lie through our
02:55
teeth i don’t condoned about lying but
02:58
we couldn’t find anybody we needed a u.s
03:00
open water swimming association number
03:02
and
03:02
couldn’t find it and then found a
03:03
private club in san fran and
03:06
he said yeah oh yeah well as long as you
03:07
pay your 150 bucks and just send me the
03:09
last uh
03:10
five races you swam in and i don’t know
03:12
you know i’m at the lake i swim in our
03:14
lake and
03:15
and i just picked five lakes in
03:16
saskatchewan and rope wrote open behind
03:18
him and he accepted our application and
03:20
the way we went
03:23
that’s awesome how long did it take well
03:25
yeah you thought it would take long but
03:27
literally it was
03:28
uh like from the island to the that that
03:31
time was um
03:32
33 minutes like i just sat there and
03:34
floated and took my time and relaxed and
03:37
backstroked and
03:38
it was a pretty easy swim they got away
03:41
all the documentaries they always made
03:42
it out like this was the most
03:45
worst swim in the world the waves were
03:47
huge the sharks would get you there’s no
03:49
way anybody would ever try to escape
03:51
and you’re like floating down lazy river
03:54
with a beer on your stomach getting to
03:55
the other end and you’re like i don’t
03:57
know what they’re talking about
03:58
yeah they got away there’s no doubt in
04:00
my mind after watching that i wasn’t
04:01
swimming for my life either
04:03
[Laughter]
04:05
or for you oh man i feel like i’ve been
04:07
totally taken on this whole thing i’m
04:09
like i can’t believe they made it these
04:11
guys are
04:13
it was amazing 10-minute swim and it was
04:14
only uh knee-deep water
04:17
yeah we were yeah we uh jumped off you
04:19
know we were done by
04:21
breakfast time and sitting there and
04:22
having breakfast in the bay and
04:24
by 8 a.m that’s amazing
04:28
now i’ve got a good story to tell
04:30
everybody that this is uh they were all
04:31
making it up
04:32
and uh excellent it was all the movies
04:34
they just made you feel like it was
04:35
crazy
04:36
absolutely unbelievable i feel like i
04:40
honestly i feel like i’ve been lied to
04:42
my whole life
04:43
jeez oh good
04:46
uh so i wanted to touch base a little
04:48
bit i guess on
04:49
when you were when you bought the hot
04:51
dogs and you really built this brand up
04:53
i really find that a lot of things that
04:55
we do in our past really define what we
04:57
do in our future
04:58
and i’d love to learn a bit more about
05:00
how nathan’s
05:01
uh one when you started this what got
05:04
you involved how did you find out about
05:05
nathan’s and what got you in behind the
05:07
brand
05:07
and then when you guys started to build
05:09
this up was there a few things that you
05:11
guys had the hurdles that you had to get
05:12
through in order to really make this
05:14
brand stand out
05:15
and then what were those learnings that
05:17
you were able to take that and say you
05:18
know what
05:18
we did such a good job here and i love
05:21
this inter
05:21
interacting with early stage in this
05:23
whole space and it kind of just helped
05:25
perpetuate you into the rest of this
05:28
networking and
05:29
being part of this whole ecosystem yeah
05:32
um i was always a great networker and
05:34
and
05:35
you know obviously being in sales i
05:36
could i i could talk and you know
05:38
playing hockey and coaching at a high
05:40
level and scouting and
05:41
it was it was something that it was easy
05:44
for me
05:45
uh my the christians my partners there
05:47
they they have the idea and they’re like
05:49
yeah you know we we want you to come on
05:51
and be part of this and we think you’re
05:52
the perfect fit for it so it was a
05:54
really good opportunity for me at the
05:55
time
05:56
um you know when i watch how startups
05:59
grow now
06:00
we were we were totally you know
06:03
well let’s go we put we thought we put
06:05
together a really good business plan and
06:07
a way we went and
06:08
and we found out 38 days later it wasn’t
06:10
that good and we pivoted and redid it
06:13
and
06:13
and hired brokers and started growing it
06:16
that way and you know before
06:17
if we didn’t do that who knows what
06:19
would have happened but it was
06:21
really let’s go figure this out let’s
06:22
figure out the brand let’s figure out
06:24
the sales let’s figure out the marketing
06:26
you know facebook and twitter were still
06:27
there so it was hands-on
06:29
um and you know trial by error in a lot
06:32
of times especially dealing with cfia in
06:34
the usda because we were an importer at
06:36
that time
06:37
and it it was a lot of uh a lot of lumps
06:41
a lot of uh this you know people always
06:43
say oh you don’t learn from the school
06:44
of hard knocks but man
06:46
there’s no other way you know she’s the
06:48
best teacher around there
06:50
and and it’s really you know to kind of
06:53
come full with
06:54
you know we had the franchise the food
06:55
service and the retail right so you
06:57
really learned how to you know play a
06:58
lot of those games and and how it works
07:00
and the cisco’s the gfs’s and the
07:02
safeway soby’s loblaws
07:04
so now when you’re playing in these
07:06
ecosystems and
07:08
you become an investor and you become a
07:10
person that’s helping fellow
07:11
entrepreneurs
07:13
you know it’s it’s a really good focus
07:15
on scale and growth where someone’s like
07:17
well i should go to this accelerator and
07:18
learn a bit more i should go into this
07:20
i’m like
07:20
get the hell out of here like get out
07:22
there start selling start learning
07:24
start figuring out what people want what
07:26
they don’t want you can’t learn that by
07:28
sitting in a classroom
07:29
and listening to someone to tell you
07:30
what their experiences was because their
07:32
experience could be absolutely
07:34
irrelevant to what you’re going to learn
07:36
over the next year in your startup
07:38
so that’s probably what taught me the
07:40
most and the the knowledge i share the
07:42
most
07:42
is is get out there figure it out and uh
07:46
and learn from what what you’re figuring
07:48
out and what you’re seeing in the market
07:50
and do you think uh like there’s a lot
07:52
of risk obviously associated with you
07:54
guys jumping into this you obviously
07:56
were in a position where you guys could
07:57
dive right in
07:59
what got you into not building your own
08:01
brand but diving into
08:03
a licensed model did it seem more
08:05
appealing to you did you find that
08:07
you know what we could really work this
08:08
and grow this significantly did you do
08:10
your market research
08:11
like all the normal startup things that
08:13
you would go through or you guys were
08:14
just like you know what
08:15
i’ve eaten hot dogs these are the best
08:17
we’re gonna take this to market i don’t
08:18
care what’s in front of us we’re gonna
08:20
bulldoze our way through
08:22
that was a part of it um the other part
08:25
is uh uh the christensens were very are
08:27
serial entrepreneurs themselves in in
08:29
the food industry and hospitality
08:31
industry so they had a really
08:33
good knowledge and background of what to
08:35
do
08:36
and and basically an infrastructure set
08:38
there where a lot of people didn’t
08:40
have um when it comes to not only
08:42
financing but
08:44
you know the back end you know the back
08:45
of the people house they could say oh
08:47
yeah you’re working on this well we’re
08:48
gonna slide this
08:49
on your desk for a little bit or
08:50
whatever it may be
08:52
but yeah it was uh we we felt that there
08:55
was room for a premium hot dog in canada
08:58
there really wasn’t one there
08:59
you know you might have you know in the
09:00
to area there you have the shopsies that
09:02
were there that people always talked
09:03
about and
09:04
and you know a hot dog here or there but
09:06
we figured we could really make a brand
09:09
and obviously nathan’s was a huge brand
09:12
we had to do more explaining out in the
09:14
west than we did in the east because
09:16
you know relative to new york toronto
09:17
and montreal and that understood and
09:19
they spend a lot more time there so once
09:22
we
09:22
people found out that we had nathan’s in
09:24
canada like mlse was one of our first
09:26
clients or like we want it
09:28
like it’s we want it we want to brand it
09:30
we want to do it
09:31
and and i tell people that they
09:34
by far are the best company i have ever
09:36
dealt with in my entire life in
09:38
any industry anywhere our our deal was
09:41
done with them in 30 minutes we were
09:43
happy they were happy
09:44
um we were making a little bit of money
09:46
we had branding that we wanted
09:48
and and then they really really helped
09:51
us
09:52
and worked with us to to grow our brand
09:54
in ontario and
09:56
so it was it was a little bit of both
09:58
when it came down to
10:00
we thought there was some uh there was a
10:03
market there that we could have and we
10:04
were right on that end of it
10:06
and the other end was was trying to
10:08
figure out how it worked
10:10
and was the sports team side of it i’m
10:13
guessing that when you look at the brand
10:14
that was your way to market so you found
10:16
your beachhead
10:17
and mlse is fantastic i’m a huge tfc fan
10:21
been a season ticket holder for
10:23
forever it feels like even if we don’t
10:25
get to go the games right now
10:27
but at the end i do feel that they are
10:29
really well coordinated they
10:31
they really line things up nicely they
10:32
do a great job
10:34
so is it sports that you kind of looked
10:36
at you’ve got sports parenting
10:38
yeah paraneetha why can’t you see the
10:40
word now oh my god sports material all
10:42
behind you
10:43
is that is that really the driver that
10:45
kind of took this home he said you know
10:46
what we’re going to gain market space we
10:48
got to go after this beach head
10:49
and then let it trickle down to grocery
10:51
and everywhere else
10:52
how did you approach that yeah food
10:54
service was our entry level
10:56
and um but again we were
11:00
we were a startup in a small business
11:01
and we didn’t have infinite amount of
11:03
money
11:04
we couldn’t cut a deal with uh we’ll
11:06
call them the two alberta sports
11:07
franchises that wanted us to lose a
11:09
boatload of money on marketing we’re
11:10
like we can’t do that
11:12
and we worked with the the ones that
11:14
wanted to work with us and become a
11:16
partner and
11:17
and sell quality and we’ll we’ll do what
11:19
we can and that was the
11:20
all of mlse it was a winnipeg was a
11:23
manitoba moose at the time which turned
11:24
into the jets and the vancouver canucks
11:27
and a lot of the other little vancouver
11:29
canadians the baseball team things like
11:31
that and
11:32
and you know we got into tons we got
11:35
into the cave we got into boston pizzas
11:37
we got
11:38
tons of la cage and golf courses you
11:41
know all over
11:42
all over canada from coast to coast we
11:44
had representation so
11:46
it was a really you know a real grind a
11:49
lot of food service shows a lot of
11:50
tastings a lot of
11:52
a lot of that and and once we figured
11:54
out that you know the food broker was
11:55
the way to go we found the
11:57
smaller independent food brokers that
11:59
were were hungrier kind of like us
12:01
that you know no pun intended but wanted
12:03
to get out there and
12:04
and and and it really worked for us it
12:07
it it was a really good plan
12:10
and it was this was still continuing to
12:12
work when when we exited
12:14
awesome and was a lot of this did you
12:17
guys focus on and this is the part i
12:18
love about
12:19
food services or getting into any sort
12:22
of food product
12:23
is that when we make an investment in
12:24
our food company we’re all about brand
12:27
we want to make sure that brand is
12:28
number one because brand can be
12:30
is going to be bigger than your sales
12:32
will be at the beginning but if you’re
12:34
in this for the long haul
12:35
you can eventually get your sales up to
12:37
match that size of brand that you create
12:39
so being that you’ve got this great
12:42
brand that was
12:43
coming into canada how much of that
12:45
helped you leverage where you were going
12:47
well it was it was a huge huge huge
12:50
proponent of our success
12:52
i mean they always used to tease the
12:54
out of us in new york saying that
12:56
the you know the july 4th hot dog eating
12:58
contest had higher ratings in the
12:59
stanley cup finals right so
13:02
and we did leverage that right we had
13:03
canadian hot dog eating contests and
13:05
here we
13:06
actually were just about to set one up
13:08
with tfc and
13:09
brian smoking their smoked fateen who
13:10
was doing his major league eating thing
13:12
and
13:13
and we were you know we were starting to
13:15
do that uh you know the hot dog is in
13:17
the form of a little more
13:19
risque that we could have fun with and
13:21
and the contest that we created and
13:23
it’s funny that you know new york they i
13:26
always consider that they were
13:28
you know a big brand but i had a twitter
13:30
before they did we canada had a
13:32
facebook page before they did they were
13:34
using some of the marketing materials we
13:36
were creating the
13:37
we had to create your own hot dog
13:39
contest with chefs and we got like
13:40
thousands of
13:42
of photos and and put it into a big menu
13:45
that was handed out at trade shows to
13:46
show people how they can
13:48
utilize what’s in their kitchen like
13:49
poutine dogs well you can’t put hot
13:51
you couldn’t put um french fries on them
13:54
because they were just too soggy on a
13:55
hot dog but we figured
13:57
some chef figured out to put hickory
13:58
sticks on them and and it was
14:00
it was a we had a lot of fun with it and
14:03
we really
14:03
made it fun and another big
14:07
differentiator
14:08
for us was even if you were mlse or if
14:11
you were jade’s mom and pop shop here in
14:13
calgary
14:14
we were we were honest with you right
14:16
from the get-go i would say okay you
14:18
know what you want you want us to give
14:20
you a sandwich sign
14:21
okay well that sandwich sign is gonna
14:23
cost us you know 500
14:25
to make we’ll get it for you but it’s
14:27
going to take me three years to make
14:29
money off
14:30
you so if you sign a three-year deal
14:31
with us we’ll give you that sandwich
14:33
board but
14:34
you know we we just can’t give it to you
14:36
and have you walk away in the year and
14:37
here here’s our profit and i would show
14:38
people and
14:39
they would appreciate the honesty and
14:41
they don’t think that you’re ripping you
14:42
off and you’re giving them something
14:43
that they want and you’re like
14:45
i just want to make a little money off
14:46
you and it might take us a year and a
14:48
half and
14:49
you know in three years let’s look at if
14:50
you want to continue it away you go
14:52
so it was a kind of my small town
14:54
mentality
14:55
of way of selling and that relationship
14:57
building and
14:58
and making sure that people believe
15:00
you’re not fleecing them
15:02
i think that’s the the fear all the time
15:04
right that you’re coming in you’re a big
15:06
brand
15:06
you’re just there to make money you
15:07
don’t care about the small guy or
15:09
anything else
15:10
but you’re coming in from the small guy
15:12
approach working with a small guy trying
15:14
to help them make money
15:16
yep so absolutely when you were doing
15:18
that and again i love
15:20
the idea behind it how did you structure
15:22
the licensing model
15:24
versus the sales and did you go back to
15:26
these small
15:27
smes and say hey look we can help you
15:29
increase your foot
15:30
traffic or increase your volume of sales
15:33
because of this brand and people are
15:34
going to love this
15:35
was there little types of metrics that
15:37
got them excited about what you guys
15:38
were offering
15:40
yeah it took us a while to get those
15:41
metrics um
15:43
you know they had them in the states but
15:45
they really just weren’t relevant to
15:47
canada we’re not a hot dog culture like
15:49
they i mean
15:50
montreal is has a really good hot dog
15:52
culture
15:53
winnipeg surprisingly has an
15:55
unbelievable hot dog culture
15:57
um but i mean other than that you know
15:59
we’ll eat a hot dog at a ballgame a
16:00
hockey game you know something like that
16:02
where
16:02
you know we’re not the we’re not like
16:04
the states so a lot of the stuff that
16:06
they had we just couldn’t use so
16:08
it took us a while to come up with our
16:09
own metrics and and a lot of the
16:13
most people didn’t have them on menus
16:14
like bars and restaurants and kegs and
16:17
and bps and things like that so there
16:19
was a lot of uh
16:20
we were breaking a lot of grounds into
16:22
to to very large chains that just didn’t
16:26
think of ever putting a premium a hot
16:28
dog on their
16:29
on their menu and now i think costco is
16:33
pretty big on that right they have they
16:35
always have this real
16:36
affordable hot dog and uh they push it
16:39
like crazy and i think they i don’t know
16:40
what the number is but they keep the
16:42
numbers and tell everybody how many they
16:43
sell and it’s
16:44
phenomenally huge yeah they’re i mean
16:47
they’re not even um
16:49
they could probably just be a hot dog
16:50
company it’s just like
16:53
the amount that they sell is just
16:55
batshit crazy it’s it’s
16:56
and it’s good i mean i still go for i’d
16:58
like hot dogs i always have i always
17:00
will
17:01
um nathans are my favorite but the
17:03
costco dog is kind of a hybrid between a
17:05
hebrew national and nathan’s and
17:07
and and it’s just a good dog and for a
17:10
buck 50 with a
17:11
with a pop how can you go wrong exactly
17:14
oh my father tells me they’re great he
17:15
does it all the time
17:18
it’s interesting you say that because
17:19
and i’m just trying to think in my head
17:20
when i’ve been traveling
17:22
there was one country where everywhere i
17:24
went they had hot dogs hot dogs
17:26
and all different fashions like cheese
17:28
on them everything
17:29
and it was every street and i can’t
17:31
think i’m trying to remember if it was
17:32
egypt or it was um
17:35
uh another um
17:38
oh man peru and i wasn’t peru but it was
17:41
just and everywhere i went it was hot
17:42
dogs but then in other countries you
17:44
don’t see them so
17:45
to me it seems like there’s such a
17:46
massive opportunity in this space
17:48
and i like that you guys were able to
17:50
take a brand blow it up
17:52
and get it into everybody’s hands
17:54
without them realizing that
17:55
hey we don’t even have a branded hot dog
17:57
and we don’t have something that will
17:58
really drive sales
18:00
and boom come in drop nathan’s in and it
18:02
just crushes it in all these spaces
18:04
but that’s that entrepreneur
18:06
entrepreneurial mindset where you’re
18:07
just thinking
18:08
opportunity there’s opportunity people
18:10
are gonna love this and it kind of
18:12
brings me back to this red bull when red
18:14
bull started to take the world over yeah
18:16
i remember sitting with my buddy and
18:18
he’s like we should be the distributor
18:19
in canada this is back in 2003 and i’m
18:21
like
18:22
you know what this is a great idea i
18:23
work at loblaws we do all this other
18:25
stuff so i started investigating it
18:27
hadn’t been picked
18:28
up yet and they wanted they would only
18:29
take people that had supply chain
18:31
expertise or that they were running
18:32
supply chain
18:34
so that they knew that the product would
18:35
get into the canadian market and then
18:37
just land and expand
18:38
so when you were going for your
18:40
licensing was that something and you had
18:42
mentioned the other entrepreneurs that
18:43
were really a big part of this
18:45
did you already have that infrastructure
18:47
set up so that you could just land and
18:49
expand
18:49
or was it you know what i’m gonna need
18:51
at least six months but i know we can
18:52
make this work
18:54
and you owned it for canada and they
18:55
were excited to get behind it
18:57
yeah it was um you know we we presented
19:00
uh
19:01
obviously they wanted to make sure right
19:02
nathan’s as protective of their brand
19:04
and their image as as
19:05
is anybody like red bull or or whoever
19:07
it is so
19:08
you know we had to go through our
19:10
vetting and and and make sure that
19:12
you know they believed that we could do
19:14
what we said we were going to do and
19:15
when we presented
19:16
so yeah that that went through it um
19:20
you know i mean like i said 30 you know
19:22
within kind of you know a couple months
19:24
we have to pivot everything and
19:26
and and and change our our train of
19:28
thought and
19:29
and we really thought we did our
19:31
homework where we probably should have
19:32
done a little more due diligence
19:34
um and maybe that lends towards my angel
19:38
investing right now
19:39
a little more a little more thorough on
19:41
that end but
19:42
you’re just like but we’re also smart
19:44
enough to realize that this isn’t
19:46
working let’s
19:47
uh let’s move forward let’s find these
19:49
brokers let’s talk to them let’s
19:52
let let’s make sure that we get them
19:54
involved and
19:55
and and the way we went so they’re
19:58
they’re like i said it was uh
20:01
there was there there was a good uh a
20:03
learning curve but
20:04
uh you know we were smart enough you
20:07
know knock on wood that it did work
20:08
so so how did you and again all this is
20:12
great because startups go through all
20:14
the same things that you are they’re
20:15
debating should i license a product
20:17
should i make my own
20:18
how do i operate this we’ve got cpg
20:21
companies that are trying to figure out
20:23
how they’re going to actually
20:24
go out of building it in their kitchen
20:26
and moving it into a larger facility
20:29
so there’s probably a million questions
20:31
you can deep dive into
20:33
how you guys processed this did you have
20:35
to get warehousing did you have to
20:37
do inventory how did you expand all
20:40
these things but i think really
20:41
the bigger question of all of this is
20:43
how did you how did you get yourself to
20:45
mitigate the risk so you would just jump
20:47
in
20:48
and go at it so kind of like were there
20:51
elements that you had to push out and
20:52
say don’t worry about those
20:54
let’s just move forward just to kind of
20:55
help that mindset of an entrepreneur
20:57
feel a little bit more comfortable that
20:58
hey you know what it’s going to be tough
21:00
but these are the things you got to look
21:01
at
21:02
yeah we kind of we had we had a little
21:04
bit of fun set away for
21:06
uh you know to make sure that uh if
21:08
there were any road bumps or it did take
21:09
longer that
21:10
um we didn’t have to kind of say oh no
21:13
oh no right that type of thing so
21:16
so we were lucky enough that way where
21:18
we you know we had a little bit of a
21:20
runway to make sure that we just didn’t
21:22
panic and
21:22
fold the tent so to say um yeah there
21:26
you know it is a food industry is a
21:28
penny industry and
21:30
um once we really got in there
21:34
and we don’t realize that we can’t be
21:36
with versa cold we got to find an
21:38
again i mean another little independent
21:40
has refrigeration
21:41
we found out quickly that cisco and gfs
21:44
will pick up their products so for
21:45
instead of us sending it over for a
21:47
dollar a box they’ll pick it up for 30
21:49
cents a box and
21:51
you’re like oh my goodness like that’s a
21:52
lot that’s a huge amount of savings when
21:54
it comes and
21:56
and so again there’s a lot of things
21:58
that we didn’t
21:59
we thought we knew we didn’t know we
22:01
found out in a hurry
22:03
and uh and and created a very
22:06
a very effective business on
22:10
for for frozen product when you had to
22:12
move it right when it got into retail
22:13
and loblaws and
22:14
and listing fees and that’s a whole new
22:16
world we don’t have to go there but
22:18
it even came down when the franchise
22:20
side of it too right opening up our
22:21
first restaurant second restaurant third
22:23
restaurant and then we were
22:24
going to be coming into ontario and
22:26
quebec but yeah it was
22:29
i mean as i said it was a lot of
22:31
learning curves
22:32
a lot of a lot of concessions a lot of
22:35
partnerships a lot of yeah i’ll scratch
22:39
mine you scratch yours
22:40
and uh let’s both make money at this
22:42
let’s have some fun with it we’ll do
22:44
whatever you want uh whatever you need
22:46
let’s uh
22:47
let’s go and um you know i always tried
22:50
to
22:50
you know there was one number for
22:51
nathan’s in canada and this it’s still
22:53
it and probably
22:54
even even a couple years ago i think i
22:56
got my last nathan’s call
22:57
it’s been a while but it was i was like
23:00
yeah you want something you phone me
23:01
you don’t you know just the brokers or
23:03
phone the brokers first i’d be like ah
23:05
you know you know throwing the brokers
23:07
but you know like brokers you fool me
23:09
everybody follow me let let’s go we want
23:10
to make this happen i don’t want to
23:12
i don’t want i don’t want i don’t want
23:13
to be the roadblock i don’t want the
23:14
broker to be the roadblock let’s let’s
23:16
get this done you want a deal let’s
23:18
figure it out
23:19
i love it it’s uh i i guess that as an
23:22
entrepreneur you see a lot of yourself
23:24
in other entrepreneurs when they have
23:26
that drive just to keep going and
23:28
they don’t want to be the roadblock they
23:29
want to be the accelerator the gas every
23:31
time right
23:32
absolutely yeah it’s uh and again that’s
23:35
the best thing about
23:36
you know doing what i do now is i’ve
23:38
been there i’ve done that i’ve you know
23:40
you’ve struggled you’ve worried you
23:41
sweated you
23:42
you know spent endless hours away from
23:44
your family and kids and
23:46
and you know you always sit there is it
23:47
worth it is it worth it and
23:49
and you know it wasn’t our case but
23:52
yeah it’s uh i always sit there and i’m
23:55
like
23:55
you know you you can’t pull you can’t
23:57
pull the wool over my eyes i’ve been
23:58
there
23:58
right i i’ve seen it i’ve i’ve sat there
24:01
across from you know million dollars of
24:03
deals
24:04
and i sat there across a hundred dollar
24:06
deal like i didn’t care i was there
24:08
yeah i like it i love it so now we kind
24:11
of fast forward and you’re taking all
24:13
this great experience
24:14
operation side of it how you guys raced
24:16
and built this company up
24:18
now when you’re looking at startups that
24:20
are coming in and you talked about the
24:21
investor side
24:22
and then going into your purpose driven
24:24
uh what
24:25
what triggered you to go into more
24:26
purpose driven versus focusing on that
24:29
next
24:30
big company or that next big startup
24:32
they want to jump into
24:35
yeah you know i was going to take some
24:37
time off and and then it was
24:38
i had a few star again like i said
24:40
before i never played in that world of
24:42
accelerators and things it was like you
24:43
know heads down let’s go
24:45
and and then i had a few reach out
24:48
saying you know what you’ve kind of you
24:49
know
24:50
nathan’s was three different sides of
24:51
you know three separate businesses and
24:53
they’re like
24:54
you kind of done this on three different
24:55
areas like we could use your help
24:57
and i’m like yeah i’m in so i really got
25:00
in there and
25:01
and what i found is i’ve always worked
25:02
for family run companies so
25:04
it’s that you know all decisions in
25:06
nathan’s were almost made over 140
25:08
words or less i guess it’s 280 or
25:10
whatever text was at that time like
25:12
there was a limit
25:13
and ah and and i’d like that right i was
25:17
like
25:18
there was that trust between me and my
25:19
partners that you know what if jade
25:22
says that we should do this i know
25:23
they’ve done it he’s done his homework
25:24
and it’s good to go
25:25
we’re just you know bouncing making sure
25:27
everybody’s on the same page right so
25:29
i i really do think that that’s you know
25:32
that found that that smaller
25:34
smaller community type thing and having
25:36
people there and
25:37
understanding and making sure these you
25:39
know the current entrepreneurs are like
25:41
no no no
25:42
that’s an excuse i don’t like excuses
25:45
you know
25:46
get out there bang on doors you haven’t
25:48
made enough calls
25:49
you know why aren’t you making calls why
25:51
are people saying no like let’s
25:52
you know i don’t like taking excuses i
25:55
never have
25:56
and i never will so the
26:00
you mentioned a a good point in there
26:01
and you mentioned community
26:03
how much of community do you that you
26:06
take from what you built into previous
26:08
companies
26:08
you now put into your startups into what
26:10
you’re doing is it a big emphasis does
26:12
it follow along with the branding side
26:15
are you really strong in those two areas
26:17
and really make sure that the startups
26:18
understand what they’re doing in those
26:19
two spaces
26:21
yeah it’s you know i always
26:24
i hate using the term of jack of all
26:26
traits but when you’re
26:28
when you’re kind of running in a
26:29
national company and you’re trying to
26:31
build it over you know
26:33
four time zones in canada you really
26:35
become and
26:36
uh become knowledgeable in a lot of
26:38
different areas
26:39
and when you’re a small team and you
26:42
have to
26:43
learn logistics you have to learn
26:45
packaging you have to learn
26:46
sales you have to learn marketing you
26:48
have to learn your people skills
26:50
you know anything along those lines you
26:52
have a lot to share
26:54
a knowledge to share and that’s kind of
26:57
where the peer guidance came in and
26:58
you’re sitting there going man i’m
27:00
seeing
27:01
you know a company a marketing company
27:03
come in and offer this startup in an 80
27:05
000
27:06
fee whereas like what the hell like you
27:08
don’t have 80 grand like that that’s not
27:10
worth 80. you know here let’s find
27:12
somebody to do it for you let’s
27:13
let’s that 70 grand that we saved you is
27:16
gonna go a long way
27:17
to making your company successful
27:19
because in the beginning
27:21
people say that you know everyone says
27:23
people’s your number one
27:25
you know resource in your capital it’s
27:26
not it’s money i mean you need
27:28
to to have the money to scale to grow to
27:31
get to hire more people that will be the
27:33
heartbeat of your company eventually but
27:35
wasting money on shitty things to start
27:37
can really be devastating and
27:39
and i saw too many stories of like i
27:42
said anywhere between you know five
27:43
thousand and eighty thousand dollars
27:45
that really bothered me
27:47
and people just didn’t know when they
27:48
had no one to turn to
27:50
and and i wanted to be that person to
27:52
say hey no come here
27:53
i know somebody or if i don’t know
27:55
somebody jeff might know you might know
27:57
somebody and we’ll put you in the right
27:59
hands where someone will get you that
28:00
knowledge for you know maybe you have to
28:02
pay for it but maybe you don’t have to
28:05
i like that and i think that
28:09
just in itself is really helpful for a
28:11
startup because
28:12
you’re right a lot of the time if you
28:14
haven’t done it before
28:15
your brain isn’t going to um oh i
28:18
shouldn’t spend this money
28:19
your brain’s going to well this is going
28:21
to bring me to that next level and i
28:22
need to be quick
28:23
so if i spend that 80 000 it’s really
28:25
going to help me get there
28:26
and then they realize two months in that
28:29
eighty thousand dollar spend didn’t
28:31
actually move the needle whatsoever
28:32
it benefited their bottom line but it
28:34
didn’t really help your startup move
28:36
that
28:37
needle and make any further sales no i
28:39
mean
28:40
it’s and and and and i almost wanted to
28:43
you know i’ve sat there and watched
28:44
people
28:45
come to tears across the coffee table
28:47
and then i was coming to tears because i
28:49
i get it i understand it
28:51
it’s personal it hurts we don’t have
28:53
that kind of money
28:54
at that stage of your business and to
28:56
make an investment on trust and
28:58
and and you didn’t have somebody that
29:01
you can bounce an idea off or
29:03
maybe it was just your wife or your
29:05
friends that are probably going to say
29:06
yeah yeah that sounds like a great idea
29:08
oh well
29:09
i know they’re they’re the experts they
29:10
should they should know and
29:12
and well no they shouldn’t like i mean
29:14
you
29:15
you know you have to do your homework
29:17
reach out talk to people
29:19
you know phone somebody phone a mentor
29:21
have a mentor
29:23
i i don’t know put put something on
29:25
facebook and linkedin you know get some
29:27
feedback from people like
29:28
you know there really wasn’t even
29:30
linkedin back then right so
29:32
we were i was lucky enough to have a
29:33
good group of people that i knew and my
29:35
mentor is still my mentor and and to
29:37
rely on things and the christians were a
29:39
fantastic
29:40
family and and fantastic business people
29:42
so
29:43
i had that uh and and if i didn’t have
29:46
it they definitely had it so there was
29:48
that network that we could rely on to
29:50
make sure that we were doing the right
29:52
things and i love that
29:55
speak to the network ask questions drop
29:57
things out there someone’s going to
29:58
answer the question especially if your
30:00
gut tells you it doesn’t work and it
30:01
doesn’t make sense
30:02
it probably doesn’t i think a lot of the
30:05
times we’re too afraid to ask or share
30:07
that
30:07
i remember and this is what started me
30:10
and my first company
30:11
in the software side is i was asked to
30:14
come in and do a review
30:15
of a platform that was built and they
30:18
gave me access to this i don’t remember
30:20
if
30:20
i was certainly wasn’t dropbox whatever
30:22
it was and i remember going through all
30:24
of this
30:25
material and then i went through the
30:27
financials
30:28
to find out and what they had spent and
30:30
they they asked me to come back with a
30:32
summary
30:33
of what we had they had built over the
30:35
year and a half
30:36
and when i i went through this it was
30:39
the most
30:40
upsetting thing i had ever had to do
30:42
when i started my company which was
30:44
go through and realize that this person
30:47
was trying to build something that
30:49
everybody turned to be so complicated
30:51
but the end was not so complicated
30:53
if someone would have taken the time
30:55
just to align it up properly
30:56
and they could have already had a final
30:58
product but 300 400
31:00
000 later it was just people screwing
31:03
the person to get
31:05
their dollar out to survive but the
31:08
output
31:09
i wrote it down in two and a half pages
31:11
and it was the worst feeling i ever had
31:12
to go back to that owner in a meeting
31:14
and say
31:15
this is what you’ve got and they started
31:17
crying and i was like it was the most
31:19
disappointing thing i ever had and i was
31:20
like i’ll never let this happen again
31:21
this is ridiculous
31:23
that you’ve been robbed by all of these
31:25
people who said they knew what they were
31:26
doing
31:26
and they just wanted to get paid they
31:27
didn’t care about the outcome
31:29
so it follows along to the same
31:32
principle of where you’re going at is
31:33
that so many people
31:35
get taken advantage of when they don’t
31:36
understand what they’re doing but their
31:37
passion is there to build something
31:39
great
31:40
and we want to and in your case you want
31:42
to or the
31:43
the group of entrepreneurs that do this
31:45
is that they want to actually help those
31:47
that have that passion and help them
31:48
educate and learn through that process
31:50
so that they can get there
31:52
and get their own learning and in hopes
31:54
they’ll go and give that back as well
31:55
when they get to that next stage
31:57
and next level of their business well i
32:00
couldn’t agree more
32:00
i mean that is so true right the pay it
32:03
forward mentality and
32:05
and you know i always you know the one
32:08
one of the most things i’m proud about
32:09
with peer guidance
32:10
is that we waived all the fees for all
32:13
of our clients during covet and are
32:14
still waiving them
32:16
and i mean i think that goes to show
32:18
that we we really believe
32:20
right i mean am i at a point in my life
32:23
where
32:23
you know like will that make a
32:25
difference for me no and and the other
32:27
four are current entrepreneurs and have
32:28
their own businesses so it was a very
32:29
easy decision when
32:31
you had to you know send out that email
32:33
or make that phone call and have the
32:34
zoom with somebody and say hey don’t
32:36
worry about it
32:37
you know put the food on your plate pay
32:38
your bills pay your mortgages nothing’s
32:40
changing we’re going to do the business
32:41
as is and when the time comes and you’re
32:43
back and we’re
32:44
pulling in some revenue we’ll start back
32:46
up again but until then
32:47
let’s uh you know let’s do what we can
32:49
to stay alive and and uh make sure that
32:51
we have a business to come back to and
32:53
well
32:54
now we’re over a year i love it awesome
32:57
good people that should have a banner if
32:59
i knew how to do that while we’re
33:00
talking
33:02
flashing lights and stuff but no that’s
33:03
brilliant uh it’s awesome
33:05
awesome what you’re doing jade i
33:07
appreciate it so now now you guys are
33:09
getting into the
33:10
to more of this support side of it and
33:12
you mentioned earlier about the
33:13
accelerator incubator side you’re like
33:15
just get at it just get out there and
33:16
build
33:17
so what’s your philosophy now around
33:20
acceleration incubators are you more
33:22
um more balanced and saying that hey you
33:25
know what these things can really help
33:26
you at that early stage there is some
33:28
education you can get from it
33:30
there’s some value that’s there don’t
33:31
spend your entire three four years in
33:33
there
33:34
but if you’ve never done it is get in
33:35
there learn it and move on
33:37
is there something you’ve taken from
33:38
that and you can push to your uh to your
33:40
startups
33:41
yeah i i’ve uh i guess i’ve kind of come
33:44
around a little bit
33:45
um you know there’s a couple good ones
33:48
in here
33:48
i really do like the junction program
33:50
that platform puts on
33:52
i i want to say it’s kind of like a
33:54
business 101 course especially if you’ve
33:55
never been an entrepreneur before they
33:57
can touch on everything you know
33:58
accounting and sales and marketing
34:00
and networking and and and all that
34:03
stuff
34:04
and and i do like the fact that every
34:07
single
34:08
um i can’t remember the associate or or
34:10
a teacher there
34:12
it is an entrepreneur has been an
34:14
entrepreneur or you know is currently an
34:16
entrepreneur
34:17
and the connections that you can make
34:18
from from that one
34:20
is is is excellent and they’ve got a
34:23
great alumni they work with startup
34:24
calgary and things along those lines so
34:27
i always say it’s good to get into one
34:29
learn a little bit
34:30
that one doesn’t take up too much time
34:32
you know four days a week for six
34:34
weeks only half days and then away you
34:37
go
34:37
and you know we’ve worked with them
34:39
before and they’ve they’ve forwarded
34:40
companies and said hey go talk to jade
34:42
or whatever it may be so i really do
34:44
and i have but i don’t understand if
34:46
someone’s going to go from there to
34:47
another
34:48
accelerator to another incubator or to
34:50
something like that i was like
34:51
oh man you you can’t you can’t do that
34:54
you have to find out if your product if
34:56
anybody even wants your product
34:58
like and i find that some people get in
35:01
this vicious cycle and
35:03
and i don’t know if it’s because they’re
35:04
scared they don’t know how to sell they
35:06
they you know i always use a turn of
35:08
wanna printer like you know so many
35:10
people want to be an entrepreneur but
35:11
they just don’t know how to and they
35:13
can’t and
35:14
and they think that they can play in the
35:15
ecosystem and and do what they can but
35:18
i’m uh you know i’m a heads down let’s
35:20
go i mean if your company’s gonna work
35:23
it’s gonna work and we’re gonna know
35:24
right away and if it’s not well let’s
35:27
kind of move on to the next thing pivot
35:29
let’s figure out how to help them pivot
35:31
right
35:32
yep yeah i like that when we talk i i
35:34
always like to
35:35
okay i get where you’re coming from try
35:37
this
35:38
yeah just go and push that right now and
35:40
then let’s talk again and see if you get
35:42
any traction because at the end of the
35:43
day time is money and if you’re going to
35:45
spend the next six months doing this
35:47
you’re just burning time and time isn’t
35:48
going to benefit anybody so let’s just
35:50
tweak something
35:51
because if it’s i think i heard this
35:53
long time ago
35:54
this great quote that the best
35:57
entrepreneurs are always blowing their
35:58
own up
36:00
because they’re always fixing it they’re
36:01
always got to change it again no
36:03
no let’s do this again i don’t know if
36:04
it’s boredom but they’re always breaking
36:06
it breaking it breaking it
36:07
and i think that that makes a lot of
36:08
sense because you’re always trying to
36:10
figure out
36:11
how to edge it one step further and
36:14
status quo isn’t edging it forward so
36:16
how do i keep
36:17
breaking something to make sure that it
36:19
gets to that next stage
36:20
oh yeah i love it blow it up here we go
36:24
next
36:26
exactly works for me i think it’s one of
36:30
those things you just wake up one more
36:31
and you’re like
36:32
something’s not right and then boom just
36:34
start blowing things up
36:35
and then you get back to the grind again
36:37
and it just feels more comfortable after
36:39
you do that and get it aligned and
36:40
moving it forward again right
36:42
absolutely couldn’t agree more well
36:45
we’re going to kind of transition a
36:46
little bit because i think there’s been
36:47
a there’s a lot of learning and i really
36:49
do
36:50
strongly believe that a lot of the time
36:52
if you take what your
36:53
core subset is the things that you built
36:55
on and then you start to drive that
36:58
further taking your nathan’s experience
37:00
all the way through
37:01
it just shows that what you accomplish
37:03
there that you can keep driving that
37:04
forward and
37:05
people are going to learn from that
37:06
experience and so i appreciate you
37:08
sharing that
37:09
and there’s kind of this one story that
37:11
i always like to hear from and
37:12
you work with a lot of startups now and
37:14
work in this space quite a bit
37:16
and you’re making a lot of investments
37:17
you’re doing all these great things is
37:19
there one story that really just pops
37:20
out of your mind and you’re like
37:22
this is what it takes to be an
37:23
entrepreneur i was working with this
37:24
founder and she did x and it just blew
37:26
it up and
37:27
that was what excited you about why you
37:29
do what you do every day
37:32
oh man that’s a that’s a tough question
37:36
um i mean it there’s so
37:40
that’s i guess that’s one thing i like
37:41
about the entrepreneurial world
37:43
right it’s people are passionate people
37:46
care it’s their idea it’s their baby
37:49
it’s their
37:50
you know they want to make it work and
37:52
and 95
37:53
99 of them are always like i need help
37:56
i’m listening i’m open to ideas and
37:59
and the one i guess the one kind of
38:01
story it’s not even a
38:04
it’s not even really a um
38:07
a success story or it it it was almost
38:09
that aha moment where
38:11
it was like one of the i think a second
38:13
or third company we were i was working
38:15
with and
38:16
that was coming in and i’m sitting down
38:18
and and you know kind of we’re going
38:20
over things they’re like wow we don’t
38:21
really know how to scale what we’re
38:23
doing we don’t know what we need to sell
38:24
how we need to sell but
38:25
you know we’ve been doing pretty good
38:26
and i was like okay that’s great so
38:28
you’ve been going here you’ve been going
38:30
there
38:30
and uh you know pitching it and doing
38:32
well i was like yeah
38:34
and you got some rev revenue and i was
38:36
like well how many you have to sell to
38:37
break even
38:38
and they’re like oh i don’t know
38:42
i’m like what do you mean you don’t know
38:43
like what’s your number like you have to
38:45
you guys are low income you know you
38:46
don’t have a whole lot of overhead and
38:48
things along those lines they’re doing a
38:50
lot of great things like it was awesome
38:51
and i was just like
38:52
what do you mean you don’t know
38:56
there was it was just there was dead
38:58
silence and i said well let’s just
38:59
figure it out
38:59
so just like literally in five minutes
39:02
we kind of did some math and we figured
39:03
we had
39:03
you had to sell you know 10 a month to
39:05
break even and all sudden their mind
39:07
mindset just changed it was an instant
39:11
i only need to sell 10 a month and
39:14
you know they were all they were all
39:15
worried about the big picture right the
39:17
scent like
39:17
how we’re going to do this where are we
39:18
going to go money we’re going to spend
39:20
we got to fly what are we going to do
39:21
and i was like let’s put our budget down
39:23
let’s look what we have to sell per
39:24
month
39:25
and then that number came out to like
39:27
- it
39:28
like it was like oh we can do that and
39:31
it was it was totally different and it
39:32
was
39:33
and that’s why i always tell people like
39:35
when you got to know your numbers know
39:36
what you know what you’re doing
39:38
you don’t have to look at them all the
39:39
time but you just have to know them
39:41
right you review them monthly and things
39:43
like that but
39:44
just just know and and relax because a
39:46
lot of times people are panicking over
39:48
things that they shouldn’t be panning
39:50
about panicking about when
39:52
math you know i don’t want to use the
39:54
word math is simple because someone will
39:56
use it and then i’ll start getting
39:57
teased on linkedin but
39:59
it’s just bring it down to your simple
40:01
base and
40:02
and and don’t worry about a lot of the
40:04
big things just yet
40:06
and and that’s probably one of the best
40:08
stories i have when it comes to keeping
40:10
it simple
40:11
agreed yeah i’m sure it blew them out of
40:13
the water when they realized the stress
40:15
reduced from that point on where now
40:17
they can start to look at
40:19
how can i plan how do i get to 15 how do
40:20
i get to 30 how do i get to 50
40:22
and then with that extra cost it’s going
40:25
to occur along the way
40:26
it’s uh there was um a gentleman that
40:29
i’ve worked with for many years
40:30
as an entrepreneur and uh he works at
40:33
shulik now
40:34
and runs schulich and i remember one of
40:37
the things that he had said was that
40:39
if you could take out the finance around
40:41
a company
40:42
the stress of it how fast and big do you
40:45
think that company could grow
40:47
and i if you know the entrepreneur and
40:48
what they’re doing and it always
40:50
just sat in the back of my mind because
40:52
i always thought of that and i thought
40:53
you know what if you could take that
40:54
stress out
40:55
how aggressive would you really be if
40:58
you could go at that market
40:59
and just drive it because you have that
41:01
passion you know exactly what people
41:02
want in your product
41:03
and how you’re gonna get it to them but
41:05
it’s that financial side that just
41:07
puts everybody on the constraints and
41:09
holds them back because they don’t
41:10
realize
41:11
uh how what the cost is or how to manage
41:13
their accounting or how to manage their
41:15
finance
41:15
so it slows the whole process down
41:18
absolutely yeah i mean
41:20
and people get so wrapped up in numbers
41:23
and then and the fear of uh
41:26
you know of of of everything that comes
41:28
with running a business and sometimes
41:30
you’re just
41:31
just you know as simple as you can
41:34
baby steps one success story at a time
41:37
you know don’t worry about what’s gonna
41:39
happen in five months worry about what’s
41:41
gonna happen this week and
41:42
and just take it step by step and and
41:46
and again i mean i’m a big fan of just
41:48
saying you know what ask for help ask
41:50
asking for help is not a sign of
41:51
weakness it’s and it’s
41:53
it’s a phrase i use all the time not
41:55
only in business but in in all the
41:57
mental
41:57
mental wellness and mental health stuff
41:59
that we’re doing out there because
42:01
you know people are scared and they
42:03
think that oh man
42:04
and people i should know everything i’m
42:06
like man you don’t know
42:08
i don’t know everything i know far from
42:10
everything i still ask for help i still
42:12
talk
42:13
to my mentor i know my mentor is now
42:15
more of a friend over the last
42:17
25 or so years like i mean i love it
42:20
when he phones me i’ll phone him up and
42:22
i’ll say something like that he goes
42:23
jade you’re an idiot like why are you
42:24
even asking me that i was like i know
42:27
right it’s like i just need i need
42:30
someone to
42:30
tell it like it is right in the way you
42:32
go so
42:34
agreed bouncing ideas is huge absolutely
42:38
i shared the other day um a story in the
42:41
the story was
42:42
if you have a problem take the three
42:45
smartest people you know
42:46
and go ask them the problem and even if
42:49
you haven’t talked to that person in
42:50
three years
42:51
go ask them the problem because you’re
42:53
going to get a perspective that you
42:54
didn’t expect you’ll get
42:55
and then your next problem find three
42:57
other people
42:58
that are just as smart that you think
43:00
can solve that problem and
43:01
keep going to three new people each time
43:04
because what that’ll do is you’ll start
43:05
to define what those three people are
43:07
all about
43:08
and then as your problems start to
43:10
escalate you’re going to remember who
43:11
helped you and solve one of those
43:13
problems that you really thought brought
43:14
a lot to the table
43:15
and you’ll start to refine those people
43:17
down as you keep growing all your
43:19
problems and keep growing all these
43:20
different
43:21
mentors and coaches that they don’t know
43:22
they’re doing this and then you’re going
43:24
to start to round them down and you’re
43:25
going to find
43:26
three to five great people that are
43:28
going to really understand your business
43:29
and understand your modeling
43:31
and that’s going to help you grow
43:32
quicker and faster
43:34
absolutely a bang on yeah just find five
43:37
new friends
43:37
working on it there’s lots of people on
43:41
linkedin you can ask random questions
43:43
they will certainly love to answer them
43:44
so
43:45
oh no ask away
43:48
i i get random questions asked all the
43:50
time i always answer
43:51
i love it i i kind of wear it as a badge
43:55
of honor if someone wants uh
43:56
oh you know wants my opinion i love it
44:00
all right we’re gonna transition into
44:01
the uh the rapid fire question segment
44:05
all right okay
44:08
how did you get started in investing in
44:10
startups
44:13
just fluke and fun
44:16
all right we’ll explore that another
44:18
time i like that
44:20
uh what’s your favorite part of
44:21
investing
44:23
the people okay
44:27
how many companies do you invest in per
44:29
year
44:31
uh it’s usually between
44:35
five and eight i love it you’re above
44:37
average
44:38
beautiful any verticals you like to
44:41
focus on
44:43
i i hate to say it but i get passionate
44:45
about food companies but i don’t invest
44:47
as many as i probably
44:48
should maybe it’s for a reason uh
44:52
but you know i when it comes to
44:54
verticals
44:55
there seems to be a lot more tech
44:57
companies um
44:58
you know as we we kind of be evolving
45:00
that way in alberta because i
45:01
i pretty much only invest in alberta
45:03
companies
45:04
okay awesome on the
45:08
due diligence side are there any things
45:09
that you look for before making a
45:11
commitment
45:13
yeah i’m a big fan of um
45:16
of having companies scale the company on
45:19
our investment
45:19
not build it so we really like mrrs are
45:22
probably one of our top metrics
45:24
okay timelines for investment
45:29
uh i guess to get a to get a deal cut to
45:32
be
45:32
at the front end it’s usually somewhere
45:34
between one and
45:36
three or so months and like it’s going
45:38
to be a seven to ten year relationship
45:41
i love that answer i never hear that but
45:45
yeah you’re right you talk about
45:46
having commit uh being part of uh um
45:50
community and then throwing in that hey
45:52
we’re in this for the long haul right
45:54
we’re gonna be talking in seven to ten
45:55
years i’m not putting this money in if
45:57
we’re not
45:57
so yeah and if you just want my money
46:00
you’re not getting
46:01
uh you’re not getting getting anything
46:03
from us
46:05
i like it uh and then follow on
46:08
investments is that part of the strategy
46:10
as well
46:12
um you know what lucky enough it it
46:14
hasn’t been on
46:15
on all of our al all of our investments
46:18
they’ve been
46:19
they’ve been picked up by by you know uh
46:21
vc led funding and we’ve been kind of
46:24
you know shunned but i don’t care that’s
46:26
that’s why you’re here right
46:29
that’s not a bad thing exactly yeah if
46:31
you’re if someone else is gonna you know
46:33
throw in a little bit we always ask
46:34
right we put it in the contract
46:36
but uh you’re not gonna hold back on
46:39
something by saying yeah we want in and
46:41
the company
46:42
said no you’re not you’re like yeah okay
46:43
we’re you know you’re go on
46:45
well we’ll we’ll get our money out of
46:46
this so we’ll we will be happy
46:48
but i like it that’s awesome yeah
46:51
okay uh anything else you look for in
46:54
factors of
46:55
investing is it um team
46:58
ceo product is there anything like that
47:01
that really stands out that makes you
47:02
jump to
47:04
yeah you know it’s uh i mean there’s
47:08
there are a lot of factors as you know
47:09
but i mean honestly i really have to
47:12
believe in the person
47:13
the people and the company like that is
47:16
a big big part of it if
47:18
i don’t think that they’re coachable or
47:20
they don’t want my
47:22
uh you know they don’t want they just
47:23
want the cake and and
47:25
and they don’t want what comes with it i
47:27
mean we’re
47:28
we’re here and i mean if they think that
47:30
they know everything and we can’t help
47:32
them well why would our money want to
47:34
why would we want our money to help you
47:36
like it just i need to believe in the
47:38
people
47:40
i like it any preferred terms like press
47:42
shares common shares
47:45
equity yeah you know it’s funny i mean
47:48
obviously you know audrey’s just
47:49
straight out equity to make it simple
47:51
um we’ve done a few commons no preferred
47:54
yet
47:54
it seems uh the everybody seems to be
47:57
putting uh you know everybody right now
47:58
i don’t know if it’s the same in
48:00
toronto and that area everybody wants a
48:02
safe right now which
48:03
we kind of say well no we’ll probably
48:05
switch that to a convertible
48:06
at the at the least but
48:10
yeah it’s pretty common safes are
48:13
are pretty big and we share that most
48:15
don’t like to invest in them but if you
48:16
put a cap on it
48:18
and ensure that there’s um a balance
48:21
there then
48:22
totally that makes sense then there’ll
48:23
be interest yeah but it’s very one-sided
48:26
so it’s tough to jump on those
48:27
but they’re cheap and if it’s early then
48:29
why not but cap it yeah
48:32
yeah uh do you take board seats
48:36
um god board teaching can get me going
48:40
um i haven’t um
48:43
we’ve kind of set up uh i’ve been advi
48:46
you know moved into kind of an advisor
48:47
type
48:48
thing on there on their thing some of
48:49
them have been early up and don’t have
48:51
boards some of them have actually helped
48:53
set up their
48:53
boards for them um but yeah i mean
48:57
sometimes boards really piss me off
49:00
so we’re gonna have to explore that in
49:03
the next conversation as well
49:08
i haven’t heard that one yet but i i’m
49:10
sure i can understand why they do
49:12
but either way interesting
49:15
yeah not all of them just some of them
49:17
yeah well i can imagine
49:18
i can imagine i can imagine all right
49:21
well we’re gonna
49:22
we’re now gonna jump into some
49:23
personalized questions
49:26
so first question favorite sports team
49:31
oh saskatchewan rough riders go riders
49:35
all right all right i was an argos fan
49:38
for the longest time that i can remember
49:40
and then i started working in hamilton
49:43
and i started going to the ti-cats games
49:46
and those fans are they’re like just
49:49
like
49:49
rough riders they are so dedicated to
49:52
the team
49:53
that found that argos fans just weren’t
49:55
the same way
49:56
and i started to find myself changing
49:58
over to
50:00
hamilton and saying i actually like this
50:02
team better because
50:03
the energy and drive that the people
50:05
come to this stadium the new tim hortons
50:07
one
50:07
is unbelievable yeah so i can understand
50:11
the passion you have for the team
50:12
because
50:13
when the community gets around something
50:15
and they’re when that team’s driven
50:16
and they’re doing well or even when
50:18
they’re not doing well the people are
50:19
still so
50:20
tied into them it’s unbelievable
50:24
well well there’s a lot of pain being a
50:26
rider fan right four great cups in 105
50:28
years like
50:29
we’ve got you know once we might get two
50:31
in a lifetime if you’re lucky
50:37
those numbers don’t sound as promising
50:39
but
50:41
still good to be a fan though absolutely
50:44
uh your favorite movie and which
50:48
character would you play in the movie
50:50
oh my god oh man i mean i worked in the
50:53
movie industry for
50:54
eight years so i i i am a movie buff i
50:58
love
50:59
oh man that’s tough i uh
51:02
i mean i’m a big uh big comedian
51:05
and i love comedy so i would probably
51:08
have to say
51:10
i’m not going to go with dumb and dumber
51:13
i’m going to go with
51:14
the big lebowski and i’ll be i’ll be the
51:16
dude
51:18
i like it if i was to take all the
51:21
interviews i’ve done and just
51:23
write down like there’s like maybe a
51:25
handful of movies that
51:27
most of the investor community has
51:29
picked
51:30
on compared to the rest like theirs
51:32
don’t get me wrong they’re spread out
51:34
but yeah ibowski is is up there for sure
51:36
oh
51:37
josh has to be he is up there uh they’ve
51:40
had more than one vote how’s that
51:42
oh absolutely i mean yeah i mean it
51:44
doesn’t matter i mean you can pick pulp
51:46
fiction i
51:46
i would probably be you know reg dunlop
51:49
and slap shot i would you know you’re
51:50
just like you can just keep going right
51:52
yeah all great movies all great movies
51:56
um all right the last one is what is
51:58
your superpower
52:00
listening and it’s as simple
52:04
as that i mean i have you know i wasn’t
52:06
good at it
52:07
i learned to be good at it and i learned
52:10
the power of listening can can lead to a
52:13
lot more success
52:15
and and make you a much
52:18
better person investor and entrepreneur
52:22
and i start with person for a reason i
52:25
mean it’s something that
52:26
you know i truly truly believe in so
52:29
whether
52:30
you have to be a good person to start
52:32
off with anything
52:34
i love it to add on to that i would say
52:38
listen twice speak once yeah
52:41
yeah and i like spiking right you put a
52:42
few whiskeys in me i’m gonna go but uh
52:44
i mean when it comes down to you know
52:47
business media it’s a whole new world
52:48
right
52:50
when you’re telling stories i got lots
52:52
of good stories
52:54
well you can share them we got time
52:58
i love it uh well jade it’s been it’s
53:01
been awesome to
53:02
to chat with you um lots of learnings
53:05
there i think we learned lots and as i
53:07
always do even though i say i was gonna
53:09
do digital i can’t i still take notes
53:11
because at the end i can’t do a
53:12
monologue after if i don’t write
53:14
everything down
53:15
there’s mine there’s there’s my investor
53:17
book right there it’s still
53:19
i’m still still that way too yeah it’s
53:22
uh i try not to but i was i was doing
53:25
them and typing them but the noise was
53:26
too loud and
53:28
so i i do write them down but i do want
53:30
to thank you again for all your time i
53:32
think the audience is going to learn a
53:33
lot from this
53:34
and we’re going to get you back on the
53:36
show again because you do have a lot of
53:38
insights and i want to learn these
53:39
stories
53:40
because the stories are the ones that
53:41
really uh get me excited because i love
53:43
sharing stories
53:45
but the way we like to kind of end
53:46
things is we like to give you the last
53:48
word so anything that you want to share
53:50
to investors or to startups i turn it
53:53
over to you but again thank you very
53:54
much for all your time today and sharing
53:56
well i appreciate it uh jp it’s it’s
53:58
something that
53:59
uh you know i love i love sharing my
54:01
stories i love talking i’m passionate
54:03
about the ecosystem and
54:05
and i guess that you know the one piece
54:07
of it the last piece of advice we’ll end
54:09
it on is
54:10
i always tell people if you ask for if
54:12
you ask for money you’ll get advice
54:15
if you ask for advice you may get
54:16
funding so i always say come at it at a
54:19
different level right think about it
54:20
differently think differently think
54:21
outside the office
54:23
um and you know try and build that
54:25
relationship before you’re gonna go out
54:27
there and ask for funding
54:29
i love it and if people want to get a
54:31
hold of you i’ve watched a bunch of your
54:32
interviews
54:33
they’re fantastic i love how you work
54:36
with the startups and chat with them and
54:37
talk them through and get them to pull
54:39
out some of that great advice and great
54:41
insights that they’re living through how
54:43
can people get ahold of you
54:44
oh yeah i mean you can go to
54:46
peerguidance.ca i know jade alberts on
54:49
54:49
i’m i’m there all the time my email is
54:52
guidance at pureguidance.ca
54:54
my cell phone’s all over the map you can
54:56
google me you’ll find lots of
54:58
sports stories and hot dog eating
55:00
stories and
55:02
and uh all you know sports interviews
55:05
and things like that but yeah i mean i’m
55:07
uh i’m there and i don’t to me it you
55:09
know i know i play in alberta a lot and
55:11
that was just because i wanted to be
55:12
around family and i was tired of
55:14
traveling but
55:15
i mean i’m i’m open to talking to
55:17
anybody i’m hosting an event here out of
55:20
out of phoenix here next month or
55:22
actually this month and 15 days you know
55:24
talking about the future of work and how
55:26
that is so
55:27
i’m always i’m always around i’m always
55:29
i always love to talk share stories and
55:31
and try and share my knowledge i love it
55:34
while you’re a good man i love what
55:36
you’re doing
55:36
keep it up and uh we’re gonna be in
55:39
touch because we’re gonna learn more and
55:40
see how we can keep working together
55:42
i love it i enjoyed it have a great day
55:44
sir i appreciate your time
55:45
likewise you too okay bye-bye awesome
55:49
well what can i say i think uh
55:54
canada the world producing a lot of
55:57
amazing people
55:58
in this entrepreneurial space and i just
56:00
love
56:01
everything that he’s been up to and what
56:02
they’ve been doing and
56:04
you know it it’s uh it’s phenomenal but
56:07
you know from taking a brand and just
56:09
blasting it out there and getting in
56:11
front of the right people and growing
56:13
that
56:13
and you know even he came all the way
56:15
around to being able to work with
56:16
accelerators and change that whole
56:18
mindset
56:19
so you know there’s a lot of value out
56:20
there you just have to go look for it
56:22
and i like that he talked about
56:23
you know being a strong operator talking
56:26
to uh and building community
56:28
and getting mentors really important it
56:31
helped him through a lot of that thick
56:32
and thin
56:33
and i think a lot of these uh great
56:35
insights were worth hearing about again
56:37
and all the new stuff that they’re doing
56:39
just fantastic so
56:42
in saying that um check
56:45
jade was awesome hope you guys enjoyed
56:48
the conversation
56:49
feel free to share like post
56:53
all that great stuff and look forward to
56:55
talking to you guys again soon
56:57
enjoy the day