The Entrepreneurs

It started in the trunk of his car. Anthony von Mandl had a dream of turning British Columbia into a world class centre of excellence in wine. At the time, he says, “No one in BC was drinking wine and the wine produced in BC wasn’t that good.”

He was 19 and he set his sights on changing all of that. He was renting a shoebox office for $29.95 per month and there were months that he couldn’t afford the rent. There were dark days along the way – dark days that pushed him to find new ways of producing and marketing fermented beverages from BC.

His story is the story of the rollercoaster ride entrepreneurs live everyday.

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The Entrepreneurs is a show that features the imaginative, innovative drivers of our economy. For more, see our website at www.theentrepreneurs.ca.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Jennifer Denouden loved being a private wealth agent. “I really liked the feeling of helping other people realize their financial goals,” she says. “I would have done that work for my entire career except that life got in the way.”

She gave birth to her first child and returned to work, only to learn she would be welcoming her second child into the family. While on maternity leave, she and her husband were looking at investing in property. The plan was to buy a lot, have a house built, and then rent it out.

The cost of construction was more than Jennifer anticipated if they had hired a contractor. “So I thought, let’s do it ourselves – how hard can it be? People build houses all the time.” So she, her husband, and two other family members teamed up to build that home.

That led to another home and then another and another. In other words, they were doing well. But why were they growing? What was their purpose? “I wanted to go back to work that was of benefit to others, so we decided the mission of our company was to build and rent quality housing in quality neighbourhoods for marginalized women – those with lower paying jobs and or women [who] needed a safe place following a bad relationship.”

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The Entrepreneurs is a show that features the imaginative, innovative drivers of our economy. For more, see our website at www.theentrepreneurs.ca.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

According to Don Bell, the co-founder of WestJet, “It’s pretty easy to lose money in aviation but Barry came up with a magic formula.” Barry Lapointe loved airplanes, going back to his earliest memories in life – just loved them.

He earned his pilot’s license before he got his driver’s license. He then became a flight instructor and then an airplane mechanic. “I figured if I could teach people to fly, then they’d want an airplane, which I’d sell to them, and then I’d look after it for them,” says Lapointe.

Sounds simple. Well, sure, if you’re willing to take the risk of opening a flying operation in the Okanagan in the early 1970s. To do so, you have to be willing to take risks. According to Barry, “You spell entrepreneur, ‘RISK’.” And that willingness to take risks led to a middle-of-the-night phone call that changed his life and the future of his business.

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The Entrepreneurs is a show that features the imaginative, innovative drivers of our economy. For more, see our website at www.theentrepreneurs.ca.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Back in the late 1990s, John Neate had a brilliant idea: “Why not open a coffee shop and take on Starbucks?” 

“Why would you!?” is the question that comes to mind. John’s answer: “Well, I’m competitive.” 

John looked at the landscape of available coffee locations and picked the east side of the east side of Vancouver. A place with a tough reputation. Why make it easy when you can do it the hard way?

With the location picked, what would make JJ Bean stand out from the competition? Espresso – great espresso – would define the brand. Espresso that, he insisted, you drank in a porcelain cup in the coffee shop. “If we could get diehard espresso lovers to love our coffee, then they would tell their friends and they would tell their friends and so on.”

It’s a philosophy that percolates into every aspect of the business.

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The Entrepreneurs is a show that features the imaginative, innovative drivers of our economy. For more, see our website at www.theentrepreneurs.ca.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

When Ash Modha was 16, he decided that he no longer wanted to work for his mother’s photo studio. He wanted to run his own business – his own clothing business. He, his brother, his lifelong friend, and uncle banded together and started experimenting with one clothing item after another.

It was a slow start. “We set up a pushcart kiosk at Grand Beach at Lake Winnipeg selling T-shirts. It was slow, so we hired skateboarders to draw attention.” It worked. They experimented with beach jams and sweatsuits. They pivoted from one type of clothing to another, to another.

Mondetta was born. It soared, it sagged, it rose again, and sagged. Over the past 40 years, Ash and the team have pivoted and pivoted again to ensure they would survive and thrive.

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The Entrepreneurs is a show that features the imaginative, innovative drivers of our economy. For more, see our website at www.theentrepreneurs.ca.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Cheryl Zealand is an accountant – a really good one. She’s also a mother – a really good one. And she’s an athlete – a really good one. Oh – and she pays close attention to the quality of food that she consumes.

As an athlete, she loved the convenience of energy bars but not the ingredients in those bars. That led her to making them for herself and her family. Over the years – yes, years – her recipes got better and better. Her family loved them and friends loved them and one day, a juice bar asked to buy some so they could sell them.

Reluctantly, Cheryl decided to make a few for the juice bar. Guess what – they were a hit and then more orders came in from more and more stores and cafes that wanted to sell them. But to make more and sell more, she would need to invest in a commercial quality kitchen. That’s a big decision for someone who had no intention of running a food business.

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The Entrepreneurs is a show that features the imaginative, innovative drivers of our economy. For more, see our website at www.theentrepreneurs.ca.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

On February 1, 2026, the Canadian Olympic team entered the iconic San Siro Stadium in Milan for the Armonia segment of the opening ceremony of the 25th Olympic Winter Games. The official jeweller to the team was Regina-based Hillberg & Berk, a company founded in 2007 by Rachel Mielke.

For a company that started on Rachel’s kitchen table, it was another step in a remarkable business story. “I always knew I wanted to start and own a business; in fact, that’s what I studied when I went to university,” says Mielke. Jewelry was a hobby, not a business that Rachel thought would become a national presence.

Central to Rachel’s success has been her commitment to quality – quality materials and quality designs that customers say make them feel special. Her commitment to quality quickly made her the talk of the town in Regina. When she opened her first store, customers were lining up to get in and experience the unique pieces she was offering in a unique setting.

Mielke says, “We want our customers to interact with the staff [and] the jewelry – so no glass cases for staff to stand behind, no glass cases to keep the jewelry out of the customers’ reach. Our customers love it and so do our staff.”

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The Entrepreneurs is a show that features the imaginative, innovative drivers of our economy. For more, see our website at www.theentrepreneurs.ca.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

When the United States attacked Iran in April of 2026, Hugh Loomans was already making plans to reroute agricultural supplies head to his Hamilton, Ontario-based company, Sylvite. Staying on top of global events and responding quickly has been key to Hugh’s success as an entrepreneur.

When Russia attacked Ukraine, Hugh pivoted the same way he did when the Soviet Union collapsed in the 1980s. As an independent supplier of agricultural nutrients and equipment, Sylivte is competing for the market at home in Ontario, Quebec, and in eastern states of the US.  

It’s a highly competitive market with major international players vying to elbow him out of the way. Hugh says, “There have been so many nights at 3 am where I’m pacing the floor, trying to figure out how to make the seemingly impossible work.” 

He’s succeeded! For more than 40 years, Hugh and Sylvite have innovated in sourcing products, packaging them in ways that meet the needs of customers, adding transportation services to his company to lower costs and, in doing so, spawning new divisions of the company.

Hugh Loomans has met the challenges of the ag sector with the same determination his customers – farmers – do everyday, because just like farming, the ag supply business changes from minute to minute.

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The Entrepreneurs is a show that features the imaginative, innovative drivers of our economy. For more, see our website at www.theentrepreneurs.ca.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Connor Curran’s entrepreneurial journey is a master class in starting a business with nothing, nada, zip, zilch – other than gumption. Determined to be the master of his working destiny, Connor moved to Sweden to clear his head and study entrepreneurism. 

He searched the web for instructions on how to set up a T-shirt company and simply started. No business plan, no money, no product. Why T-shirts? “They are the lemonade stand of today!” says Connor. Print-on-demand means you can design and market your product at no cost and if someone buys it, “that’s the biggest dopamine hit; that’s the fuel that keeps you going,” he says.

Bit by bit, Connor walks us through the process he followed to build a business, build up a cash reserve, go from print-on-demand to amassing inventory, and refining his marketing strategy – a strategy the White House validated and ignited his sales.

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The Entrepreneurs is a show that features the imaginative, innovative drivers of our economy. For more, see our website at www.theentrepreneurs.ca.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Terry Fox worked his way down the rocky shoreline of Newfoundland just outside the city limits of St John’s and dipped his artificial leg in the Atlantic Ocean. He bottled water that lapped at the shore and turned west on his Marathon of Hope – a marathon that brought attention to fighting cancer through research.

That was on April 12, 1980. Little did Allen and Connie Eaves know that Terry’s crusade to defeat cancer would change their lives. A year after Terry’s heroic marathon ended because his cancer had returned, Allen and Connie came to Vancouver to establish the Terry Fox Research Lab.

And little did they know that the chain of events that would unfold and lead to the creation of a world renowned biotechnology company, STEMCELL Technologies. Allen and Connie’s story unfolded in a manner that becomes apparent only by looking back.

The Research Lab was always short of funds for further studies and equipment and supplies. So Allen developed a research related product that the Terry Fox lab needed and he sold the excess to other labs. That product was a hit, so much so that a competitor undercut their price and drove them out of that market. With a researcher’s mindset Allen looked for other products to fill the funding gap for the lab. What he created is still a staple of the company’s business today.

It’s important to note, he was also the Head of Oncology and Hematology at Vancouver General Hospital where he and a colleague engineered the practice of isolating healthy bone marrow in patients with leukemia. They killed off the unhealthy cells, fostered the regrowth of the healthy cells and transplanted them back to the patient – a procedure that VGH sold to health authorities across Canada, netting the hospital large sums of money.

When Allen was 54 years of age, the Terry Fox Research Lab told him he had to spin off the company that was developing, producing, and selling products. So he did, working off the side of his desk and, in cooperation with the Lab, STEMCELL Technologies was established

When Allen turned 65, he was told it was time to retire. The very next day, he was working full-time at STEMCELL, which had grown to more than 50 staff. Today, the company employs more than 2,500 people and sells its products and equipment globally.

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The Entrepreneurs is a show that features the imaginative, innovative drivers of our economy. For more, see our website at www.theentrepreneurs.ca.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.