That Digital Take with Torri Webster

Canadian fashion designer and entrepreneur Tanya Taylor joins host Torri Webster on That Digital Take to talk about the business of creativity and what it takes to build a fashion brand women truly connect with.

Since launching her namesake label in New York City in 2013, Tanya Taylor has built an internationally recognized brand. It’s known for vibrant colours, hand-painted prints and inclusive sizing, and it’s been worn by Michelle Obama, Beyoncé, Taylor Swift and Ariana Grande. In this episode, Tanya shares how she went from studying finance at McGill to fashion design at Parsons, what she learned working with Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen at Elizabeth and James, and the early mistakes that cost her time and money.

We also get into how social media and TikTok have changed the fashion industry, whether celebrity red carpet moments or creator content matter more today, what brands get wrong about influencer marketing, and how to tell a passing trend from something that lasts. Tanya opens up about inclusive fashion and confidence, coming home to open her Toronto flagship store, launching the Tanya Taylor Fashion Lab at Havergal, and co-founding Baby Love, which has helped provide millions of diapers to families in need.

In this episode:

• Building a fashion brand with staying power
• Balancing creative vision with commercial success
• Hiring and building a team you trust
• The best money she’s spent growing her business
• Social media, influencer marketing and viral fashion moments
• Mentorship and advice for women in creative careers
• Motherhood, ambition and giving back through Baby Love and Creative Club
• A rapid-fire round on style, confidence and New York vs. Toronto

Whether you’re an entrepreneur, a creative, a marketer or a fashion lover, this conversation is full of real insight into building a brand, a business and a legacy.

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What does it really take to turn a great idea into a brand people love?

This week on That Digital Take, Torri Webster sits down with Lauren Levy, the co-founder of Odd Cookie Snacks, the Canadian snack brand turning bite-sized, crispy cookies into a nationwide business.

After building successful careers and businesses of their own, Lauren and Devin found themselves asking one big question: What's next? Their answer? Starting something completely new, together.

From launching in a single Toronto retailer to expanding into 800+ stores across Canada, we're getting into the realities of entrepreneurship, building a business with a friend, navigating growing pains, and what it actually takes to stand out in a crowded market.

Plus, we're talking about the power of authenticity, social media marketing, knowing when to pivot, and why sometimes the most important part of building something successful is being willing to start over.

Whether you're dreaming of launching a business, navigating a career change, or figuring out your next chapter, this conversation is for you.

New episodes of That Digital Take every week.

Fall is officially here, and that means cancelling plans, getting on the couch and committing to something good.

This week on That Digital Take, Torri sits down at TIFF with Summer H. Howell and Alison Thornton, stars of Mike Flanagan’s Carrie on Prime Video. This new version of the Stephen King classic is set in high school today, with social media, group chats and viral moments. Summer (Carrie White) and Alison (Chris Hargensen) talk about:

• Landing roles after a search of more than 1,000 actors
• Auditions, rejection and building a career as young actors
• Playing a character who is cruel to your castmates, and leaving her behind when they call cut
• Bullying in the age of social media
• What fake blood is really like, and the moments they broke character

Then Torri goes solo with her fall TV and film lineup:

• Her review of Verity, starring Anne Hathaway, Dakota Johnson and Josh Hartnett
• Her verdict on Carrie
• What Practical Magic 2 needs to get right
• Avengers Encore and the road to Doomsday
• Robert Pattinson in Primetime, and her Dune homework

Why are some creators landing $30,000 brand deals while others with bigger followings can't book a campaign? Sara Koonar, founder and president of Platform Media, one of Canada's leading talent management and influencer marketing agencies, reveals what's really happening behind the scenes. This week on That Digital Take, Sara pulls back the curtain on the business of the creator economy.

After a decade of building Platform alongside the industry, and launching Platform Social, Canada's leading influencer marketing conference, she knows exactly what brands and managers are looking for. In this episode:

• What a talent manager actually does, and when you need one
• What Platform looks for before signing a creator -
•  Does follower count still matter in 2026?
• Why one creator gets $3,000 and another gets $30,000 for the same deliverables
• What creators undervalue in negotiations: usage, exclusivity, whitelisting and more 
•  "Why am I not getting brand deals?" and what's really going on
• How AI is changing influencer marketing
• The Canadian creator economy vs. the U.S. 
•  How to build a creator career that lasts ten years

Whether you're a creator, a marketer or building a personal brand, this is the insider conversation every influencer needs to hear. Follow That Digital Take for weekly conversations on business, branding and digital culture.

What happens when a broken ankle turns into a global fitness empire? This week on That Digital Take, Michael Ramsey, co-founder and CEO of STRONG Pilates, shares how a frustrating recovery on the reformer sparked the idea for a workout with more strength and cardio, and how that idea grew from one Australian studio into an international brand with locations across Canada and around the world.

Michael gets honest about what it really takes to stand out in a saturated fitness industry, why the Pilates algorithm is such a volatile space, and what he makes of the viral "Men vs. Pilates" trend. He also shares the one piece of advice every entrepreneur needs before starting a business, how fitness marketing has completely changed since 2019, how to handle social media haters as your brand grows, and the "worst-case scenario" exercise he uses when things get hard. Plus, his biggest Pilates hot take and the wellness brand he can't stop talking about.

Whether you're a Pilates devotee, a founder, or a creator trying to build something that lasts, this conversation is packed with lessons on brand building, business growth, and knowing the difference between a trend and a movement.

Chapters:
11:08 – Plan A, Plan B, and the worst-case scenario mindset
13:22 – Classical Pilates vs. modern Pilates
16:28 – The "Men vs. Pilates" trend
20:39 – The #1 rule before starting a business
27:05 – Dealing with social media haters
28:57 – How fitness marketing has changed
36:09 – Why he loves Eight Sleep
38:33 – Michael's Pilates hot take

Anna Lambe, award-winning actor, filmmaker and star of CBC/ Netflix North of North, joins That Digital Take for an honest conversation about what a working acting career actually looks like.

Anna opens up about wanting to give up "all the time," the black box of self-tapes and casting, and why the glitz and glamour people imagine around film and television doesn't match the job. She also gets into shooting North of North through three straight weeks of blizzards, working with Inuit showrunners from the North, how she memorizes a script, why Emma Stone is a guiding light, her first TIFF back since she was a newer actor, and the boundaries she keeps around social media.

Chapters:
5:45 — Wanting to give up
8:33 — Auditioning before and after Covid
11:07 — The self-tape black box
12:22 — The Hollywood glitz myth
14:51 — Making North of North
20:34 — Blizzards and shooting in the cold
26:42 — Emma Stone and guiding lights
31:55 — How she memorizes
35:27 — Back at TIFF
41:40 — Social media and boundaries

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It's been a while since a solo episode, so this is a proper catch-up, and it ends somewhere I wasn't expecting.

First: D23 as a first-timer. Sneaking onto the grounds early thanks to friends in high places, the celebrity sightings, and Disney laying out everything they have coming. Then one perfect day at Disneyland with Adam.

Then the main event, the bachelorette. Thirteen girls, planned entirely by me from January on: transportation, villas, menus, every moving part. JSX down to Cabo to meet the bachelor party, a welcome day at a villa that genuinely blew my mind, private chefs, a boat day I negotiated from the living room, a BBQ pool day, Bagatelle in unreasonable heat, and a Sunday surprise that was not for the faint of heart. Huge thank you to Suzanne and the Creative Destination Events team for every balloon and custom detail that made it TORCHELLA, and to the Cabo Villas team for taking care of us on every level. Cabo as a bachelorette destination: land, sea, party, relaxation, you get a bit of everything.

From there, straight to New York with Moroccanoil to celebrate Aryna Sabalenka as the new face of the brand. Very glam, very spoiled.

And then everything stopped. After losing someone close to me, I took time off, and that's the topic of the week: leaning on creativity in times of grief. A Labour Day weekend spent alone, clearing out my home because moving energy matters, new shows (Homeland), and honest reflections on living in contrast.

If you're in a season of high highs and low lows, you're not alone. Holding space for you.

Love you all.

While Torri is off for Labour Day weekend, we’re pressing replay on a very special That Digital Take episode: Torri’s first-ever guest, best friend, and longtime content creator Jaclyn Forbes.

Before we’re back with brand-new episodes next week, revisit the conversation that helped kick off TDT’s guest era.

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Jaclyn Forbes has been creating online since the early days of YouTube — and in this episode, she joins Torri to unpack what it really takes to build a lasting career on the internet.

The best friends get into Jaclyn’s evolution as a creator, the iconic moments that shaped her career, and the lessons she’s learned through years of trial and error. They also talk about navigating genuine friendships in an industry that can sometimes feel anything but genuine, keeping up with the relentless pace of content creation, and staying authentic while growing online.

And, of course, they tackle one of the biggest questions in social media: can you actually crack the code to consistent virality?

Jaclyn thinks you can.

From embracing the weird, wacky parts of yourself online to evolving your content as you evolve in real life, this conversation is a throwback worth pressing replay on.

New episodes of That Digital Take return next week!

Most people in the creator economy build the audience first, then figure out what to sell. Mel Grauds did it backwards, and it worked.

Mel founded Melrose Training in 2020 with virtual classes, one-on-one clients and no following. Six years later she's running three Toronto studio locations, Yorkville, Rosedale and King West, plus virtual training and LIFT, her new small-group strength class. Along the way she's partnered with alo, Knix, Under Armour, Formula Fig, Revlon and Healthy Planet, and was chosen by Sporting Life to lead the official stretch at the Sporting Life 10K.

In this episode of That Digital Take, host Torri Webster sits down with Mel to talk about what the business actually looks like behind the Instagram version, and the bet she's making that's quietly rewriting the influencer event playbook: taking the production, the brand access and the budget, and pointing all of it at real customers instead of creators.

They get into the real barrier keeping women out of the weight room, the cost of building a brand on transparency, the structural risk of being the face of your own company, how motherhood changed what she's willing to say yes to, and how you prove community is real when brands only measure impressions.

Topics covered: creator economy · fitness entrepreneurship · brand partnerships · influencer marketing · community building · women's strength training · Toronto small business · motherhood and entrepreneurship · in-person events · personal branding

Mark Gaetano — Snarky Marky — is seven years into a career most creators don't survive two of. 4.9 million TikTok followers, 380 million likes, and he's doing it full-time from Toronto.

Host Torri Webster sits down with the creator behind the teacher POVs, the cafeteria monitor and "the volume inside of this bus is astronomical" to talk about what's actually changed in seven years — and what it takes to keep up.

Mark is refreshingly specific about the craft. When he started, a video was one continuous take, 15 to 60 seconds, no cuts. Now the hook is everything, and he explains what shifted in the last two to three years and what creators have to learn from it. He talks about working through creative resistance, why burnout is real once this becomes the full-time job, and how he handles the dry spells between brand partnerships after six years of relying on them. He also makes the case that YouTube Shorts pays, a fact he thinks most creators still misunderstand.

Plus: school was always Plan A, why posting on TikTok used to be considered cringe, the strange truth that no two For You Pages are alike, how COUCHella came out of a little FOMO and turned into 26 million views, and why he thinks the lifestyle niche might be in trouble.

In this episode:
(00:00) The bus video and the five years before it
(09:21) School was always Plan A
(19:28) When posting on TikTok was still considered cringe
(20:30) Why everyone's For You Page is different
(21:31) One continuous take to fast cuts — how the format changed
(22:32) Why the hook became everything
(23:40) Working through creative resistance
(25:05) Fight or flight, and going full-time
(26:41) Burnout is real — the strategy for managing it
(27:47) Six years of brand partnerships and the dry spells
(29:38) You can get paid on YouTube Shorts
(31:22) The hardest part: socializing with other creators
(40:13) COUCHella, FOMO, and 26 million views
(44:45) Why the lifestyle niche might be in trouble

Follow Mark: @snarkymarky on TikTok and Instagram
Follow the show: @thatdigitaltake 
Hosted by Torri Webster.