April 2018
In this issue
From using a photo of Winston Churchill on his own LinkedIn profile to often referring to him during lunch, Peter Armstrong has a passion for the formidable British leader. But Armstrong’s admiration is less focused on Churchill’s Second World War prowess than on his failings. The founder and CEO of Armstrong Hospitality Group Ltd., Vancouver-based owner and operator of the Rocky...
Earlier this year, Loblaw Cos. Ltd. offered customers $25 gift cards as recompense for the grocery retailer’s part in a price-fixing scandal. The product involved was bread. This is not corny slang referring to the thing at the heart of every price-fixing scandal, but the actual, sliced, sandwich necessity. Last November, Loblaws was named in a proposed $1-billion class action...
Regus Group, based in Atlanta, provides furnished workspaces for rent in more than 3,000 business centres worldwide. The company’s year-old facility at the corner of Willingdon Avenue and Lougheed Highway in Burnaby offers traditional private offices, but the focus is on communal and coworking space.
Were the folks who created Hatch, a technology incubator based on the UBC campus in Vancouver, aiming for the familiar trope of scientists huddled in a basement lab? Heading down into the bowels of the Institute for Computing, Information and Cognitive Systems (ICICS), it’s easy to imagine scores of geeks fiddling away on obscure computer programs. The reality: in every nook...
As April brings the province’s first annual Construction Month, independent contractors are struggling under the weight of insurance and loan interest while they wait for clients to pony up, says BCCA president Chris Atchison. “Smaller contractors are refusing to work for certain individuals, or they’re changing occupations—which isn’t helping our workforce issue,” Atchison explains. Ontario enacted prompt-payment legislation last December...
Arc’teryx Equipment’s massive new factory may be lean and designed for efficiency, but nothing rushes through the place. Take the Alpha SV: workers spend 192 minutes and almost 200 steps turning a bucket of parts into the popular alpine jacket.The Alpha is one of Arc’teryx’s most labour-intensive products, with a $900 price tag to match. The North Vancouver-based outdoor clothing and...
BCBusiness + FUSION SECURITY What does it take for a business to be safe? It’s a question more salient than ever for company owners and management, especially as companies grow their assets.Security cameras are one option. Locks are vital. And if the business is a vulnerable construction site or factory, guards may be a necessity. Unfortunately, the security industry is dominated...
BCBusiness + ERNST & YOUNG Most people see retirement as an opportunity to step back from the work life and indulge in some leisure time. But Allen Eaves isn’t most people. When the founder and former director of the BC Cancer Agency’s Terry Fox Laboratory (TFL) took mandatory retirement, he turned a side project into an innovative international biotechnology company. And...
BCBusiness + Ernst & Young It’s no secret that British Columbia is home to some of the most ambitious, creative and daring business minds in the country. From billionaire Jim Pattison to fashion mogul Brian Hill, there’s something about the Pacific coast that nourishes a particular kind of entrepreneurship—the kind that dreams big, wins big and gives big. For 25 years...
BCBusiness + ERNST & YOUNG The inaugural Pacific Region Entrepreneur Of The Year awards program takes place in Vancouver. Among the category winners: philanthropist and financier Milton Wong (right), politician and funeral-services chain operator Raymond Loewen and merchant banker W.B. (Bud) Kirchner. A year later, when EOY starts to name overall regional winners, United Furniture Warehouse founder John Volken takes home...