Here’s How It’s Done: First-hand Stories From Enterprising Women In Manitoba

“As a young woman wanting to be in the outdoor industry, there was always this sense of not quite belonging, and I didn't necessarily put my finger on it until I realized that everyone who was teaching me how to do the things were men… There was always this feeling of, am I good enough? And also, this feeling of who's my role model? I can't find them.” - Lise Brown

Lise Brown was in her early 20s when she set out to find year round work in outdoor adventures in Winnipeg. And it didn’t take her long to find out how challenging it was -- not just to find a job, but to really find a place.

That’s when she co-founded Momenta, along with her business partner Sara Harrison, with the aim of being open and welcoming to everyone, regardless of shape, size, class or skill level. 

For 17 years Lise and Sarah have been breaking new ground with adventure therapy programs and outdoor education that’s grounded in personal wellbeing and social justice. 

Find out how Momenta’s business model works, why they certified as a B Corp (and garnered B Corp ‘Best in World’ status in 2021!)...and how the core value of having fun has pulled Lise through the tough times as a business owner.

https://experiencemomenta.com/

https://www.instagram.com/experiencemomenta/

https://bcorpdirectory.ca/

“Sometimes I wish I could just plunge in and just go big, you know, I see some companies are younger than [mine] and they're making millions. But then at the end of the day, I always say I like to baby-step it. I need to digest every moment. So then it doesn't get out of control.”

Andréanne Dandeneau is the founder and CEO of Anne Mulaire. Her company designs, makes, and sews award-winning, eco-conscious  fashion wear, inspired by her Métis heritage. That all happens right here in Winnipeg – and then these award-winning collections sell to customers across Canada and beyond.

Just over two years ago, Andréanne embarked on a big rebrand and expansion. What does it take to scale up with a set of values rooted in slow fashion, products made in small batches, in-house with natural and organic fabric. And how do you run a business where you are manufacturing and selling products on one hand, and you are encouraging people to buy less on the other?

What’s the secret to her success? “For any entrepreneur out there that is wanting to do something, you really have to think first, at what moment would you be happy, and you're good -- you know, because like success can be very greedy, it can mean so many different things. But at the end, it really has to align with your values.”

Find out how Andréanne is breaking the mold of fast fashion – and doing it in style!

Here's How It's Done is brought to you by Women's Enterprise Centre of Manitoba. It's hosted and produced by Cate Friesen, The Story Source.

https://www.instagram.com/annemulaire/

https://annemulaire.ca/

What do you think of when you hear the term ‘side hustle?’ The first thing that might come to mind is someone who has a 9 to 5 job and starts an enterprise in their spare time, with the aim of making the leap to full-time business as soon as possible. But there are lots of other reasons that people start a side hustle -- to test out a business idea to see if it has legs, make some money on the side, or simply because there’s something they really want to have but no one is selling it.

“For me it was something I wanted to be seen in, and I wanted it to be seen,” says Kim Blackburde Moore. Kim has always loved clothing that had ‘Mama Bear’ on it. “And I think that kind of comes from me being from the Bear Clan. And I said something to my daughter, who at the time would have been 11 years old. She said, “You should really get a Mama Bear hoodie done up but in Ojibwe…and get me a baby bear one.”

Instead of getting two sweatshirts made, Kim invested in a whole lot of products, and then had to figure out how to sell them! That’s how Makade Migizi Clothing and Apparel got started. 

Find out how starting this side hustle led Kim to fulfill a lifelong dream of learning her mother tongue. And get inspired to take your passion project to the next level! 

Here's How It's Done is hosted by Cate Friesen of The Story Source and sponsored by the Women's Enterprise Centre of Manitoba. 

Lourdes Still is the first to admit it’s a winding road that landed her in business. She’s gone from big-city living in the Philippines to rural life in south-eastern Manitoba. From growing flowers on the balcony of her city apartment to launching Masagana Flower Farm & Studio. There’s no doubt that it takes ambition and a lot of hard work to run a sustainable small scale flower farm in Manitoba’s short growing season, but Lourdes faces her challenges with a mindset of abundance, and a heart set on joy.

If you are looking for inspiration and a road to launching your own enterprise, this show is for you. And if you already own a business, Lourdes’ story will remind you about why you work hard to make it happen, and how you get to define success on your own terms.

Here’s How It’s Done is brought to you by the Women’s Enterprise Centre of Manitoba, the go-to place for women looking to start or expand their businesses. It’s hosted and produced by Cate Friesen, The Story Source. 

Check out the resources that Lourdes Still used to grow her business:

WECM for the Strength in Community Workshop series last Fall. I learned a lot from their presenters and gained a new community through peer mentorship with fellow women rural entrepreneurs. 

To EastMan Tourism for their initiative to develop new and unique tourism experiences and coach business owners in the EastMan region. It helped me imagine, shape and build the future of the agri-tourism side of my business. 

To Gelaine Tan Santiago, my marketing coach. She's a fellow Filipina, storyteller, content marketer and social entrepreneur. She empowers Black, Indigenous, and founders of colour to scale their e-commerce businesses and build wealth to uplift our communities.

- Lourdes Still

You’ve got to be a bit of a risk taker to launch your own business. And that wasn’t Lucy Sloan. “I was that person that had the strict budget. I had a savings for when I was gonna have a child….I had that perfect score at the banks. And so I had everything kind of in control. And I liked that.” Then eight years ago, a fall down the stairs upended her entire life. She had no choice but to give up that sense of control. “I think that actually played  a big part in becoming an entrepreneur ... you kind of have to be okay, with things not going well, and being broke for a little bit.” 

If you are thinking that Lucy knows how to turn lemons into lemonade, you’ve got that right. After that life-altering injury, she turned her farmyard near St. Malo, Manitoba into a one-of-a-kind animal-assisted therapy facility. At Lil Steps Wellness Farm Lucy and her staff work with children, youth and adults experiencing mental health challenges from anxiety, depression and ADHD. And their co-workers include a fainting goat, miniature horses and a pig named Wilbert.

Find out how Lucy built partnerships instead of competing for business, learned hard lessons in setting prices for services, diversified long before COVID called for pivoting, and where her business is headed next.

Here’s How It’s Done is brought to you by the Women’s Enterprise Centre of Manitoba, the go-to place for women looking to start or expand their businesses.  It’s hosted and produced by Cate Friesen, The Story Source.

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/lilstepswellnessfarm
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lilstepsfarm/
Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCKi0LiwAtQubTXkqWZtbWAw

Documentary about Lil Steps https://www.ami.ca/category/our-community/media/lil-steps

“I started because I wanted to do something different. And I wanted to change the way things were being done. And also bringing out new products that I haven't seen in Winnipeg. It seems like a lot of people wanted it.” - Laura Gurbhoo, owner of Gâto Bakery

Laura Gurbhoo grew up in the tiny African island nation of Mauritius, with a fascination with chemistry and a family that loved to cook together. She headed to Winnipeg to study with her sights on becoming a pharmacist, but baking was always a passion too.

That’s how Gâto began. A side hustle driven by wanting to do something different. The twin challenges of making the perfect sourdough and vegan baked goods—and doing it with the smallest carbon footprint possible. No small feat! For one thing, it took a year to perfect that sourdough vegan croissant. And when you taste it, you will be so glad Laura persisted. 

Find out how Laura took her business from her home oven to farmers’ market to a bustling bricks and mortar shop in Winnipeg’s West End. And how that degree in biochemistry came in handy in more ways than one. 

As Laura writes, “When you support Gâto not only are you supporting a black woman’s dream, but you support a product that was created from packaging to sourcing main ingredients with the purpose of reducing carbon footprint while optimizing flavours. When you buy at Gâto you support your local farmers' livelihood and make an environmentally conscious choice.”

Here's How It's Done is hosted by Cate Friesen of The Story Source and sponsored by the Women's Enterprise Centre of Manitoba. 

“When we can be open to receiving the gifts of the universe, whether that be financial abundance or whatever一seeing ourselves not just as users of a system, but also makers of a system, to see ourselves as magicians, because as women we are able to create, and to bring into being life, right? And so, how do we translate that ability and that strength and that magic into the work that we do?” - Sandra DeLaronde, Northern Sage

If you are, as Sandra says, a magician, using your abilities and strengths to bring your work to life in a new way as an entrepreneur一and if you are interested in abundance, in being the maker of a system, then this episode is for you.

Starting your own business can feel like uncharted territory and sometimes it’s hard to see a way forward. In order to move forward, Sandra suggests that maybe we need to look back, to learn from our mothers and our grandmothers, and to see ourselves as creators in our work. Oh, and how laughter can be a great business practice!  

Sandra is the founder and owner of Northern Sage, a consulting firm that focuses on empowering and raising up Indigenous women, their families, and their communities.

She’s a member of Cross Lake First Nation with roots in the Métis settlement of Duck Bay and she’s a passionate advocate for ending violence and supporting the families of MMWG + 2 spirited people. 

What Sandra has to share, with the lens of her experience and wisdom, sheds so much light on what it means to be enterprising – in our businesses, our families, and in our communities. 

Here's How It's Done is hosted by Cate Friesen and brought to you by the Women's Enterprise Centre of Manitoba.

We are launching Season 2 of Here’s How It’s Done with special guest Anna Hunter, the mastermind behind Long Way Homestead. Anna lives and works on 140 acres along with her husband Luke, their two sons, 20 laying hens, a flock of Shetland and merino-cross sheep, and two llamas. And by the way, those llamas keep the coyotes away. 

Six years ago Anna sold her East Vancouver yarn store, Baaad Anna’s, to start a family fibre farm and wool mill east of Winnipeg. Anna and Luke had zero experience farming. “We named our business Long Way Homestead because we seem to always choose the long way around, we go for the biggest challenge, the toughest hill to climb rather than the easy way.”

Anna did have experience in business so she drew up a five-year plan. They would start by raising chickens and then work their way to sheep in the fifth year. But Anna admits she is inherently impatient. “I couldn't imagine waiting five years to start sheep. So I started trying to understand how I could make a business out of sheep.” 

Find out how Anna moved from crowdfunding to business loans, the ingredients for successful diversification, and why their mill is integral to a vibrant fibreshed in Manitoba. And, above all, how spinning a good yarn in every sense of the word is the secret to making a ‘business out of sheep.’ 

“The fact that we were city kids, and we moved to the farm, and now we're just doing it and we're sharing our success. We're sharing the total failures and everything in between. And so connecting people, specifically knitters and crocheters, and fiber artists, with the source of their wool, is what I'm doing. Yes, I'm selling woolen yarn, but I'm actually selling this story.”

Brought to you by the Women's Enterprise Centre of Manitoba. Hosted by Cate Friesen, from The Story Source. 

If you have ever dreamed about opening up a bricks and mortar store, this episode is for you. And if you love a good story where the stakes are high and the main character refuses to give up, it’s for you too!

For 20 years Cyndi Pedwell ran a successful home-based business, Ped's Threads, providing custom logo'd apparel and accessories to businesses, schools and sports teams. And then last March she made a big business leap. 

On today’s show we are headed to the main street of Flin Flon, where Cyndi opened her first retail outlet in March of 2020.  It was a dream come true for Cyndi when those doors opened to customers for the first time…yep just two days before the pandemic slammed them shut again.  And she is the first to say that this year it’s been quite a ride so far. 

“During COVID, most people were so excited to work from home in their pajamas. Right? And I was like, ‘No, but you took away my dream now of putting on nice clothes and going to work and having discipline because I'm a workaholic. When you work from home, you don't ever shut business off.’ Whether she was at home or at the new store, Cyndi definitely couldn’t shut business off this year. 

Find out how Cyndi steered her business through some rough waters this year, and how COVID19 forced her to come up with creative solutions that resulted in new products and local partnerships. 

And Sandra Altner, CEO of the Women’s Enterprise Centre of Manitoba also makes a special guest appearance. She has great advice for aspiring entrepreneurs and how peer mentorship can help you grow your business.

Be prepared to be inspired.

What’s the problem your business is solving? You may have heard that very common business question. In this episode, Kylie Matechuk turns that question on its head. This successful Thompson Manitoba entrepreneur shows us what happens when you take the problems you need to solve for yourself and turn them into solutions for customers.  

Kylie got a taste for business during a brief stint selling Avon products as a teen. When she was 19 she took her hard-earned savings and opened the doors of her first business in downtown Thompson. ‘The fun is in the risk’ has been her motto ever since then. When she became a mom, she transitioned into an entirely new home-based business. Kylie grew that into a multi-faceted bricks and mortar enterprise, and after closing those doors a few years ago, she moved her holistic health-based business into another, more virtual space, KylieAdele.com 

Catch the entrepreneurial spirit of innovation, problem solving and staying authentic on this episode!