Not every business can make it big on Toronto’s Queen Street West. Co-Founder and President of Drake General Store, Carlo Colacci knew it’d take purposeful collections of hand-curated treasures to attract people of all ages. “Our key demographic is everyone. We’re trying to appeal to the young, to the old, to the family, and everyone in between. We try to appeal to the curious culture seeker.” Carlo, in partnership with his Co-Founder Joyce Lo, run the Toronto-based Drake General Store, a unique one-stop-shop for modern and classic Canadian goods that fill all it`s buyers with intrigue and nostalgia. Working with local artists and and in-house designers, Carlo’s curations reflect the modern version of the classic general store. The company’s expansion to other cities like Ottawa, and addition to an online shop that ships across the country, also reinvigorated the interests of local roots while scaling back the fast-changing fashion and consumer good industries. In this week’s #StartupPodcast, we’ll talk to Carlo about how our cultural products can maintain authentic Canadian identity, all the while keeping up with the changing trends of contemporary lifestyle.

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