Before The Dust Settles

Ryan Meili is a family doctor, author, "upstream" advocate and leader of the Saskatchewan NDP party. We chat about the importance of upstream thinking, the link between health and happiness, managing media bias and cutting through sound clips using long-form media for deeper conversation and connection. We also touch on longboarding and the balancing act of remaining a normal guy while living as a public figure.

Meredith Rhinas is a mom, wife, teacher, blogger and Instagram maven. Her account, @meredith_deanne, has over 43,000 followers and growing. During our chat, Meredith explains how paid IG partnerships work, building trust with her audience, the journey of building a personal brand and claiming taxes from an IG account. We talk about the realities of social media fatigue and the cause and effect of IG removing the "like" count from posts. She also gives some dos and donts and rules of thumb for the platform.

Jay Brown is an adventurer, outdoorsmen and founder of saskhiker.com. From a young age, his family encouraged him and his siblings to spend time outside exploring. In 2015 Jay was fired from his job. Instead of wallowing in self-pity, he launched saskhiker.com, which is now one of Saskatchewan's most informative sources for those looking to explore the province. Jay chats with us about his habit of being a quick starter, his shift in perspective after becoming a search and rescue volunteer and completing a 100+ km hike. Jay gives tips on how to avoid getting eaten alive by bugs while hiking, and the focus he puts on being intentional about the things he posts online.

Becky Palmer has a Bachelor of Science in Pharmacy. Although Pharmacy is still a part of her life, her passion lies in her work as a health and relationship coach. Becky is the founder of Brilliance Health Coaching and currently finishing her Masters of Arts in Counselling Psychology. As a coach, Becky helps people that are looking for improvement, taking things from good to great. During our time, we chat about the role spirituality plays in coaching, the influence that your mindset and attitude have on your life. The actual differences between excitement and fear and how to control these sensations. We also chat about the importance community has on health and wellness and how technology is helping and hindering society.

Nicole Ens is a professional photographer; in her short career, she has already accomplished a great deal. At the age of 20, her business was already big enough to warrant hiring an assistant and has allowed Nicole to travel around the world, practising her craft. Nicole chats with us about what motivates her, the challenge of juggling creative expression and client requests. She talks about the other ways she's using photography to capturing the human condition and her desire to design a life that allows for travel, self-direction and creative expression. We discuss the importance of not wasting time and her willingness to share work that is reflective of her interests and perspectives.

Andrea & Jesse are the creative forces behind the award-winning Nolita Studio, a YXE based recording, multimedia and artist development company. They've produced for many artists including Codie Prevost - RADIO which won 2019 SCMA Album of the Year. During our time together, we discuss how the company has developed over the past two years. Jesse reveals how many Spotify plays it takes to earn one dollar on the platform and Andrea tells us about how she learned to create music videos using YouTube tutorials and subsequently become nominated for best video of the year. 

Nigel Baxter is a franchisee for Everline Coatings, a line painting business that was recently showcased on the TV show Dragons Den where Nigel helped the founder successfully pitch. During the time of our conversation, this was still hush-hush, so we weren't able to discuss it. However, we do chat about Nigel's crash course in entrepreneurship as a franchisee for college pro painter, handling the fast growth of that venture while juggling his course load. We also discuss Gary Vvaynerchuk, our mutual interest in podcasting, droning and the importance of removing barriers in the pursuit of getting sh*t done. 

Kurt Spizawka owns contender construction and has been training in the sport of Muay Thai & Kickboxing for over a decade. At the time of our conversation, he had just finished his 12 amateur fight. During our time together, we chat about the mindset shift from Kurt's first fight to his most recent. He explains where you'll get the best "bang for your buck" when landing a punch and the art of cutting weight. Kurt also discusses how mental fortitude and preparedness learnt through combat sport has impacted his entrepreneurial journey.

Maxwell Raeburn, is a Saskatoon-based musician playing frontman for "Raeburn" and member of "Ancient Pig". He has an extensive musical pallet that extends to performing, consuming and discussing music. We chat about the death of the CD and its impact on the modern-day merch table,  how tech has disrupted music mastery, current bands making a splash in YXE and what a ten out of ten looks like for Maxwell (it's not money or fame).

Chad wears many hats. Outside of co-founding and running Golden Media Co., a YXE based video production company. Chad is also a musician, host (The Buzz, CFCR), trained urban planner, bootstrap hot sauce manufacturing and adventurer. During our time together, we chat about how savvy businesses are using video to showcase their people and culture, trashing a house during a music video shoot and the growing appetite for long-form video content.