BC Business
Gibson’s, B.C. – made Holy Crap cereal almost didn’t make it to the TED Cafe at last week’s conference. The owners of the organic cereal, first made famous by Dragons’ Den, were given just a few days to deliver thousands of cereal cups to the Vancouver and Whistler conference locations. The problem, says co-founder Brian Mullins, was that Holy Crap in single serve cups had just launched in January and the company had minimal inventory.
“It got to the point that if anything happened we couldn’t replace it. So we rented a truck ourselves and drove it up to Whistler and to the conference centre in Vancouver to make sure because we couldn’t have replaced them,” says Mullins.
The handmade, certified organic, non-genetically modified, allergen-free cereal line was created in 2009 to offer a good tasting product for people with food allergies. The single-serve cereal cups have recently gotten attention as they were the breakfast of choice for Commander Chris Hadfield during his recent Expedition 35. Colette Lynch of Procreation Design Works, which manages TED, approached the Mullins to have the single serve Holy Crap Original and Holy Crap Plus Oats on hand in the TED Cafe for speakers and attendees.
“We are choosy about who we partner with -showcasing only the best of the best, featuring all natural ingredients, organic flavors and innovative packaging,” said Lynch in a statement. “I came across the product at my local grocer and took a chance on contacting Holy Crap to see if they could ship 3,000 single cereal cups within two days.”
The last minute rush to get their product into TED has paid off, says Mullins. He has already received three or four calls from Chinese in the last week, a great sign since the company is currently in the process of being approved in the Chinese market.
“Now Holy Crap has more credibility on an international scale than it has in Seashelt,” he said.
Michael Green, of Michael Green Architecture, also sees the international attention that TED draws to his business. Green was first approached to get involved with the stage construction by TED owner Chris Anderson when Green was giving a TED talk entitled “Why We Should Build Wooden Skyscrapers” in Long Beach in 2013. Anderson then called him up around Christmastime, asking Green to design and build the community stage.
“Ted has expanded my international reputation,” says Green, who has won numerous architectural awards and currently has projects on the go including a contemporary art gallery in China and an upcoming tree fort for Ronald McDonald House.
Working with the TED conference will also have a positive on tech security company Nanotech Security Corps’s reputation, predicts Clint Landrock, executive vice president of products. Nanotech was selected to design and produce an exclusive event access ID for participants. The company was approached in fall of 2013 – ideal timing as Nanotech was in the process of releasing its first commercial product.
“What’s most important for us is we now have a very solid reference to show that we can commercialize this nanotechnology and use it in a very real way,” says Landrock, adding that the collaboration is great news for Nanotech’s shareholders.