This Commerce Life

Alain (Alan) teaches us a few things about the cooking industry, talks about his first job at Canoe. With the pandemic, he gets laid off and winds up making creme brulee.  Alain could use some help here - so if our audience can help out, he could use a contact for some jars at a better cost. Reach out to us at @thiscommercelife or thiscommercelife@gmail.com or contact Alain directly at @crystalcr3...

20-25 years with a single company, and structured out...these folks are facing steep challenges. Trevor has some suggestions on how to find your next career change.    To find Trevor: https://www.linkedin.com/in/trevoratmacdonaldsearchgroup/ https://www.macdonaldsearchgroup.com/headhunter-in-vancouver

Tim practices in the areas of business law and intellectual property, and has a broad range of experience dealing with commercial transactions and technology law matters, as well as resolution of business disputes. He acts for clients in all manner of transactions, including mergers and acquisitions, start-ups, financings, corporate governance and contract negotiations.   To check out Tim's firm:...

Now 4 stores, and making ice cream - Sarah and her husband Adam are rocking chocolate on the Rock.   Check out Aunt Sarah's Chocolate shop here: http://www.auntsarahschocolate.ca/   Find Sarah here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sarah-rochacewich-686b061/

Aside from the fact that Liza thinks Kenny looks like George Clooney (in the dark in poor lighting), we talk retail - click and collect, omnichannel retailing and Liza's work to help retailers understand how to live and work in  today      Find Liza at: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lizaamlani/ Liza's blog: https://www.themerchantlife.com/ Retail Strategy Group: https://www.retailstrategygroup.com/

An incredible conversation with a talented individual, Alys has a lot to say about how to think about your skills differently, and how to approach looking at opportunities differently.   To find Alys: https://www.linkedin.com/in/alysrichards/    

Doug DuMars comes from Kraft/Heinz and Pepsi,  talks about his experience working for two of the biggest CPG companies in the world, to jumping in as a startup in the  drink space, founding Rebellious Infusions.     To find Doug:  https://www.linkedin.com/in/dougdumars/   https://drinkrebellious.com/ If you're interested in samples, head to  https://Samples. DrinkRebellious.com    

Philly and Nicole laugh about how long they've known each other, they geek out about email marketing and how it can power a business' growth. The boys are amazed at Nicole's skills and how many pots she's had her hands in.    To find Nicole: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nicolemjmurphy/ Check out Bell Curve here: https://www.bellcurve.com/  

Shelby started working on Chickapea in 2015. Today, Chickapea is everywhere!    Check out Chickpea here: https://chickapea.ca/ You can find Shelby here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/taylorshelby/

Phil and Angie talk old J&J days and Philly relives some battle scars that left marks. Angie talks about putting her strategic skills to work with the Save the Children Organization, getting deployed to El Paso and helping children reunite with their families.   To find Angie Baker - https://www.linkedin.com/in/angiembaker/

The boys talk about getting their businesses right, how they're thinking about the year. Philly struggles to help an owner become a CEO. Philly talks about how to think about client hours and how and when to work a little harder, when to balance versus family life.  Philly's pro-tip for the month - last month was WIFI Mesh, and now Philly wants you to think about buying a budget gaming laptop. (su...

We had lots of guest come and hang out for our last podcast of the year.  This one is pretty fun - if you want to watch it, it'll put faces to voices.  Head to https://youtu.be/QI4iS-Gsrso Some of our guests that came by: Tim Dumas, Jaks Alcohol Stephen Sotto, Bed Bath & Beyond Mexico Mark Stirling, Orion Sales Cherry Yang, Air Ops Consulting https://www.airopsconsulting.org/ Tazz Latifi, https://...

Long time "rock" of the retail industry...Alan Bates comes up, we talk career progression and Philly drools (as usual) over Daiya's new lineup of products.   You can find Chris here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/chris-bailey-4130958/ You can find Daiya here: https://daiyafoods.com/   Drool over Daiya's food lineup here: https://www.youtube.com/user/daiyafoods/videos

The Boss, Linda, talks about the pandemic from a manufacturer's perspective...A manufacturer that makes hand sanitizer. The boys and the Boss talk about concerns about the upcoming year, how to look at growth differently, and they talk growing up and ethnic backgrounds.   Check out Linda's profile here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lindambwebb/   find Prolab here: http://www.prolabhealth.com/

When businesses land funding and have a chance to grow, it's always exciting. It's even more exciting when it's a business that helps other businesses solve communication and operational issues.    On top of that, the business is a friend of the show - that's very exciting! CEO of Intelocate, Yulia Vasilyeva comes on to talk about her $1 million in funding from TCap Private Equity.   To find Yulia...

Parachute Software rolls out a new menu ordering platform that's simple to use and cost effective. Calling all restaurants - a profitable way to do take out!   To check out Parachute Software: https://www.parachutesoftware.com/ Check out their ordering page here: https://order.parachutesoftware.com/order/ You can find David here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidlinton/

We talk to Shane Pounder, Vice President Operations and Interim Vice President Marketing at Flipp and we talk about consumer behaviour vis a vis digital shopping, the struggle of getting good content and some new channels Flipp is exploring.    To find Shane, click here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/shanepounder/ To get Flipp, click here: https://flipp.com/

AnneMarie runs a great after school tutoring centre that was doing a steady business before Covid. Covid shut her down and she had to do things differently and bring her tutoring online.  Word of mouth used to drive the business but she had to change how she did things, used Facebook ads, Google ads to drive traffic into her centre.   To find AnneMarie: https://www.linkedin.com/in/annemariebrosnan...

Philly and  Winnie reminisce about the good old days, and  comes on the show to talk multicultural marketing. Winnie has serious experience marketing to the Canadian population, and we talk about the intricacies of cultural marketing.   To find Winnie:    https://www.linkedin.com/in/winniebmittal/

The distributor discussion continues -  some real life examples on how companies approach this.  The knuckleheads talk innovation and what comes next in this pandemic era. We've had a lot of cool guests on talking about innovation and how to look at things differently. We had a chance to just sit and chat and talk about cool stuff that we think might be coming.   At the end, we talk about WIFI Mes...

Canada’s leading distributor of natural health products. From dietary supplements, vitamins and natural body care to eco friendly household products and natural health food products, Purity Life supplies products to over 7,000 stores across Canada.   To check out Purity Life click here: https://www.puritylife.com/ You can find Mike at https://www.linkedin.com/in/mroberts6/

We were inspired enough to put this episode in the same week as another game changer. (see prior episode about Kelly Pigeon and Dresst)   Green Planet Wholesale is the supplier of equipment, a new kind of garden store. We were inspired to here where they're going, and how they've approached this growing and emerging segment of the market. To find Green Planet Wholesale click here: https://www.mygr...

Kelly Pigeon started with the big "WHY," founds two game changing platforms -Dresst, then Loopt.  We talk about how to reduce consumption and waste in durable goods, and change the way the industry builds clothing, and the way consumers see clothing.  She doesn't stop there - she takes the platform she builds on Dresst and turns it into a model that other businesses can use to also run a rental bu...

We talk about how business owners / solopreneurs need to embrace teams and let their people help them grow. The guys get into the weeds and talk about the planning process, how to make sure departments stitch plans together so they function as a cohesive unit.    The book we were talking about: https://www.eosworldwide.com/traction-book

We head to Africa to learn from "Fats" Diamini, Founder of Maneli Foods. We get a crash course on building a brand in South Africa and the joys and challenges of running a global brand.  To find Nhlanhla "Fats" https://www.linkedin.com/in/nhlanhla-dlamini-0671531/   Maneli Foods is here:   http://manelipets.com/