business in vancouver 20th anniversary commemorative issue

COMMEMORATIVE ISSUE

Celebrating two decades of

and B.C.’s top business stories

20YEARS

1989–2009

20Anniversary.indd 1 10/15/09 8:48:51 AM

360º thinkingThat’s the Deloitte difference


Contents

Business in Vancouver at 20Keeping score . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .4

MILESTONES

Hollywood North1978-present . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7

Softwood battles 1982-2006 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7

Light rapid transit starts connecting the Lower Mainland1986-present . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .8

Rise (and fall) of the cruise-ship industry1986–present . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .8

Towering ambitions1988-present . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .8

Power struggles1989-present . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9

Courting aboriginals1990-1997 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9

China’s bull runEarly 1990s-2008 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9

Food for thoughtEarly 1990s-2009 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12

NDP’s second chance1991-2001 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12

Disappearing acts1993-1999 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12

Beetle bother1996-present . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13

B.C. finally wins Winter Olympic gold1998-2003 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13

Forestry fallout1999-present . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14

B.C. Liberals return to power2001–present. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14

Mercury risingEarly 2000s-present . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14

Contained growth2003-2009 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15

Building bridges2003-present . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15

Mining boom2006-2008 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16

B.C. swings back to deficit budgets as global economy sinks2008-present . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16

20TH ANNIVERSARIESCEO InsightsConcert Properties . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10-11The Fifth Option . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24-25

LIST

Biggest B.C. organizations celebrating 20 yearsRanked by total number of staff in BC . . . . . . . . . . . .17-19

INFLUENTIAL BUSINESSPEOPLE

An artist’s eye Michael Audain . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20

Strictly commercialAvtar Bains . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20

Captain Capital Peter Brown . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21

“A millionaire in no time”Glen Clark. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21

Minister of everythingDavid Emerson . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21

Telecom team leaderDarren Entwistle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21

Mining mogulFrank Giustra . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22

B.C. biotech’s queen mumJulia Levy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22

Louie LegacyBrandt Louie. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22

Game-industry godfatherDon Mattrick. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22

Retail play Sue Paish . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23

Business billionaire Jim Pattison. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23

Building VancouverDavid Podmore . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23

An Olympic-sized featJack Poole . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23

Condo kingBob Rennie. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26

Biotech bellwetherDon Rix . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26

Carole knows bestCarole Taylor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26

A Golden career Ian Telfer. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26

Athletic apparel trend-masterDennis “Chip” Wilson . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27

Dragon’s flare Milton Wong . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27

SUBSCRIBERS

George Godfrey . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28

Rick Featherstone . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28

Shirley Broadfoot . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28

Axel Krieger . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28

Nils Thaysen . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28

Darlene Sanders. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28

Rudy Nielsen . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29

Robert Matthews. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29

Julie Marzolf . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29

Paula Keats . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29

Mark Startup. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29

Elsbeth Turner . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29

Eric Martin . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29

Brian McGavin. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29

Santo Sandhu . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29

Bill Dix . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30

Mac Campbell. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30

Sharon Bortolotto . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30

Glenn Chalmers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30

Greg Whittaker . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30

Business in Vancouver TWENTIETH ANNIVERSARY 2009 | 3


Business in Vancouver at 20Keeping score in Vancouver’s business community

Curt Cherewayko

Like many new publications, Business in Vancouver lost money in its first years. But with unique offerings and continuous acquisi-tional growth, it’s now a staple in the community. Two of the news-paper’s co-founders recall how it survived and eventually thrived, growing into what is today a multi-title publishing house.

When the premier issue of Business in Vancouver hit the streets on October 2, 1989, Beach Avenue was setting

real estate sales records in Vancouver; Bill Vander Zalm’s So-cial Credit party was days away from losing an important bye-lection in the Cariboo region; and Cambie Street was Vancou-ver’s trendiest business corridor as rumours of a possible rapid-transit line surfaced.

At the national level, businesses were grappling with how to capitalize on the new North American Free Trade Agree-ment; while the proposed goods and services tax (GST) was being declared dead in the water by some short-sighted busi-ness analysts.

Proving that times stay the same even as they change, Van-der Zalm, now a vocal opponent of the proposed harmonized sales tax (HST), is still making headlines as is the Cambie cor-ridor – although the Canada Line hasn’t yet been the boon to businesses that had been hoped in 1989.

A number of business folk who followed such issues in the pages of BIV back then continue to turn to the weekly for busi-ness news.

George Godfrey, owner of Burnaby’s Fleming Decal and Sign, discovered BIV when he was contracted to design decals for the newspaper.

He subscribed in the newspaper’s debut year and continues to subscribe, finding BIV – and our small-business section in particular – a good source for sales leads and coverage of Van-couver’s business community.

“For a small company like mine, it’s pretty cheap market in-telligence,” said Godfrey.

Peter Ladner, George Mleczko and the late Art Rennison founded BIV to fill a gap in the Vancouver newspaper market.

In 1989, the city had monthly business publications, as well as business sections in the dailies, but was void of weekly news-papers with a business bias.

To launch the newspaper, the trio initially scraped together $800,000 and eventually brought more than 40 individual in-

vestors into the fold.As with many new publications, BIV’s first years were mea-

gre. “We lost money for the first two or three years, as expected,”

recalled Ladner. “We had to go back to our investors and get more money, which is never easy.”

Nonetheless, the newspaper expanded its scope, introdu-cing supplements and such full-format magazines as Ad Pages and the Book of Lists. BIV’s weekly lists have been staples in the newspaper since its first year.

Another staple was the late John Caspar, BIV’s longtime fi-nancial columnist. He passed away October 9 after a lengthy battle with cancer. His first column appeared in BIV’s debut issue.

The annual Top Forty Under 40 competition was launched in the newspaper’s second year.

According to Ladner, the lists, Caspar and the Top Forty Under 40 competition all helped separate BIV from the pack early on. Today, Ladner sees a more confident newspaper with an established brand name and proven track record.

“When we first started calling up people and said, ‘Tell us all your financial information so we can make a list and rank you against your competitors,’ they would say, ‘Who are you?’”

Mleczko recalled that organic growth led to acquisitional growth, with BIV buying publications like Western Investor, the Employment Paper and Visitors’ Choice.

“We started making money – and we used that money to purchase other products and bring them in-house,” said Mlec-zko. “We knew that if we ran them through our little publish-ing house, it would be more efficient, and the margins would be bigger.”

BIV’s founders bought out most of its original shareholders by going into partnership with what is now Glacier Media Inc. Glacier, which owns a number of media assets, eventually ac-quired the entire entity and remains BIV’s parent today.

Aside from its print offerings, BIV has instituted a number of community events and award functions, including the Top 100 Fastest Growing Companies, Top 100 Private/Public Com-panies, the Colour Breakfast Series and the Influential Women in Business Awards.

Like Godfrey, longtime subscriber Paula Keats, a vice-president of Vancouver’s Vivid Graphics Ltd., generates sales leads from BIV’s lists and editorial content.

BIV is still feeling out how it can best position itself online,

4 | TWENTIETH ANNIVERSARY 2009 Business in Vancouver


but Keats has nonetheless taken to its online offering: she pri-marily browses BIV on the computer monitor, rather than on the print sheet.

Conversely, Glenn Chalmers, vice-president of local sales at Astral Media Inc.’s radio division, has rarely visited BIV’s web-site, but has received weekly print editions since 1989.

Chalmers, who follows BIV investment columnist Thane Stenner and sales expert Jeffrey Gitomer, continues to read BIV for a simple reason.

“It still delivers what I want,” he said. “Things haven’t changed with me wanting to keep up in a time-efficient manner with what’s happening in the local marketplace.”

George Mleczko (l) and Peter Ladner, at BIV’s original headquarters on Cambie Street in downtown Vancouver, saw a gap in the Vancouver newspaper market when they launched BIV with the late Art Rennison in 1989. They’re shown with the preview issue (September 11), featuring First Generation CEO Steven Funk, and the first issue (October 2), featuring Harbour Ferries owner Graham Clarke



www.biv.com phone: 604-688-2398 fax: 604-688-1963

Publisher and CEO: Tom Siba; Editor: Timothy Renshaw; News Features Editor: Baila Lazarus; Editorial Proofreader: Noa Glouberman; Staff Writers: Krisendra Bisetty, Curt Cherewayko, Richard Chu, Glen Korstrom, Andrew Petrozzi; Art Director: Randy Pearsall; Photographer: Dominic Schaefer; Production Manager: Don Schuetze; Production: Rob Benac, Don Chin, Cole Johnston, Carole Readman, Natalie Reynolds, Soraya Romao, David Tong; Director Sales and Marketing: Cheryl Carter; Group Marketing Specialist: Regan Macdonald; Advertising Sales Director: Nick Hiam; Display Advertising Sales: Janice Frome, Doug Holt, Blair Johnston, Chris Wilson, Dean Wunsch; BIV Magazines Publisher: Paul Harris; Sales Manager: Joan McGrogan; Advertising Sales: Regina Bailey, Lori Borden, Shannon Clarke, Corinne Tkachuk; Administrative Assistant: Katherine Butler; Sales Co-ordinators: Heena Chauhan, Victoria Gibson; Senior Researcher: Anna Liczmanska; Research/Verification: Caroline Smith; Director of Circulation: Dale Dorsett; Subscription Sales Supervisor: Navreet Gill; Subscription Manager: Veera Irani; Subscription Sales: Guli Adler, Gerard Veeneman; Retail Merchandising Representative: Paige Millar; Office Manager: Dennis LeBlanc; System Administrator: Les Valan; Accounting: Denise Moffatt; Credit Manager: Yvonne PoschBusiness in Vancouver is published by BIV Media Limited Partnership at 102 East 4th Avenue, Vancouver, B.C. V5T 1G2. Telephone 604-688-2398; fax 604-688-1963—For reprints: Veera Irani 604-608-5115E-mail addresses: [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected] WWW.BIV.COM

Business in Vancouver Media Group also produces:DATABASES

Business contacts: Generate new sales leads, new contacts, and stay in touch with directory databases from BIV Magazines.

OTHER PUBLICATIONSWestern Investor: Western Canada’s only

commercial real estate and business opportunities publication. Call for your free sample, 604-669-8500, www.westerninvestor.com [email protected].

The Employment Paper: Vancouver’s only recruitment and career-training newspaper, available free at newsstands. Call 604-688-8828, www.employmentinvancouver.com [email protected].

Better Business Bureau Guide: The official consumer guide and members list of the Better Business Bureau of Mainland British Columbia. Call 604-688-2398, www.biv.com.

Visitors’ Choice, Vancouver: The city’s leading tourism publication. Three seasonal editions plus a Japanese and Chinese language edition. www.visitorschoice.com.

Visitors’ Choice Publications also produces annual publications for more than 17 British Columbia communities. Contact us for a complete list. Call 604-608-5180 / 1-800-867-5141, [email protected].

Award-winning local business

news and information every

Tuesday in print, and daily online

ISSN 0849-5017

INCLUDED:

The Book of Lists – an annual collection of BIV lists (Industry focused business contact names, numbers, data).

Adpages – News and commentary on the advertising, marketing and communications industries.

Office Space – A guide to leasing commercial real

estate in Greater Vancouver.Meeting Places – B.C.’s meeting, event and

conference planning guide.BC Tech – A guide to technological innovation in B.C.Home Makeover – A guide to home renovations, full-

home makeovers and home building.Right Course – B.C.’s professional development guide.The BC Advantage – A guide to doing business in

British Columbia.Green Space – B.C.’s sustainability resource.How-To Book – Business tips for B.C.

PLUS, FREE BY REQUEST, YOU CAN RECEIVE THESE OTHER VALUED BIV MAGAZINES:

Life Sciences B.C. – The official annual publication of LifeSciences B.C.

Property Managers’ Source Book – Specifically designed for the property management industry.

To contact BIV Magazines, call 604-688-2398.

GET IT ALL as part of your annual print & online subscription, PLUS:Optional Daily and Weekly Business News email updatesSearchable online archives of over 15 years of local business newsBIV Magazines: A different industry focus every month

How to subscribe:Subscribe and save up to 60% off the newsstand price:

Monthly-continuous $6.68 (+GST), 1-year subscription $79.95 (+ GST), 2-year subscription $135 (+ GST), 3-year subscription $189 (+ GST), 1-year online subscription $79.95 (+ GST)

Call Veera Irani: 604-608-5115 e-mail [email protected] or visit our website: www.biv.com



MILESTONES

Hollywood NorthVancouver’s rise to prominence has made it the third-largest film-production centre in North America

1978-present

With the establishment of the B.C. Film Commission in 1978, the groundwork was set for the growth of the province’s billion-dol-

lar film and television production industry. Despite languishing around $200 million in annual spending throughout the mid- to late-1980s, the decision by producer Stephen J. Cannell to build North Shore Studios, which opened in 1989, put Vancouver on the map. Chris Carter’s The X-Files solidified the city’s reputation as a production centre as infra-structure was put into place to deal with the rising levels of U.S. service work. Bridge Studio’s expansion followed North Shore’s opening. Van-couver Film Studios continued to grow. By 1993 production spending broke $400 million; it doubled to more than $800 million by 1998. The following year, it broke $1 billion in production spending, growing to almost $1.2 billion in 2000. While spending declined in 2001 and 2002, it rocketed back up to more than $1.4 billion in 2003, before dropping back down to $801 million in 2004. It climbed to $1.233 billion in 2005 and $1.227 billion in 2006 before dropping again to $943 million in 2007. Last year, it was back up to $1.207 billion.

Softwood battles Lumber saga pitches trading partners against each other

1982-2006

As a major Canadian exporter of softwood lumber to the U.S., B.C. found itself embroiled in what turned out to be one of the most

enduring trade disputes in modern history. The U.S.-Canada softwood-lumber dispute centred on claims by U.S. lumber producers that Can-adian producers were being unfairly subsidized by government and therefore required a countervailing duty tariff for lumber exported to the U.S. to offset the subsidy.

Canada had rejected the claims, and after much legal manoeuvring, the latest dispute was settled with the implementation of the Softwood Lumber Agreement in the fall of 2006 when the U.S. agreed to lift duties and return billions of dollars in duty deposits. But the condition that ex-port taxes would be collected by Canada if lumber prices dropped below a certain range led to some criticism of the deal by Canadian producers.

Twenty years of groundbreaking eventsFrom softwood sagas to energy power struggles to pine-beetle infestations, British Columbia’s business community has had its share of unforgettable events. Here is our editorial pick of the top 20 milestones of the last 20 years



MILESTONES

Light rapid transit starts connecting the Lower MainlandVancouver’s public-transit system goes space age in 1986

1986-presentConceived of as a legacy project for Expo ’86, the SkyTrain monorail showcased the fair’s theme of “Transportation and Communication: World in Motion – World in Touch.” Starting as a demon-stration project in 1983, at its official opening in January 1986 it ran from

Waterfront Station in downtown Vancouver to New Westminster Station until 1990. The SkyBridge was built in 1990 to cross the Fraser River and expand service to Surrey. It was further extended in 1994. The Millennium Line, which first opened in 2002, was not completed until January 2006 with the opening of the VCC-Clark extension. The newest extension, Can-ada Line, which opened in August 2009, runs from Waterfront Station to Vancouver International Airport in Richmond. The role of the SkyTrain has been emphasized in the public-transit plans for the region with plans for the Evergreen Line and the Broadway Line, but funding remains an issue.

Rise (and fall) of the cruise-ship industryDrawing more than one million passengers annually at the turn of the millennium, cruise industry now sailing in stormy seas

1986–present

Cruise ships started calling on Vancouver’s Canada Place cruise ter-minal in 1986 after the completion of Expo ’86. That first season

saw 300,000 passengers on 233 sailings. The popular Vancouver-Alas-ka cruise route continued to grow, contributing much to Vancouver’s reputation as an international destination and helped develop a vibrant tourism industry as it grew throughout the 1990s.

In February 1993, the Vancouver Port Corp. decided to redevelop Ballantyne Pier, which was obsolete as a cargo facility and marginal as an overflow terminal for the cruise-ship industry. The solution was to

redevelop the pier into a facility capable of storing and loading wood pulp on a year-round basis and handling cruise ships during the summer. It was completed in 1995. Canada Place itself was subsequently expanded and upgraded at the turn of the millennium to handle an additional berth. The expansion came just as the industry hit its high-water mark of 1.125 million cruise passengers in 2002. More than a million passengers had been arriving annually in 2000 and 2001. But just three short years later, 2006 passenger traffic had dropped to just 837,823 passengers compared with 910,172 passengers in 2005. Passenger numbers rebounded to 960,554 revenue passengers in 2007, halting the four-year slide that started in 2003. But the resurgence didn’t last long as it dropped to 854,493 revenue pas-sengers in 2008. By August 2009, 731,882 revenue passengers had come through Vancouver compared with 703,458 by August 2008.

Towering ambitionsExpo land redevelopment transforms city landscape

1988-present

Concord Pacific Group Inc.’s legacy as a major developer began with Concord Pacific Place, North America’s largest master-planned

community, on Vancouver’s False Creek. The $2 billion mixed-use waterfront development on the former 204-

acre Expo ’86 site has steadily changed the city’s skyline since 1994 and



MILESTONES

now includes more than 10,000 homes, blending in public parks, three kilometres of seawall walkway, schools and retail and commercial ser-vices.

Prior to Expo ’86, most of the site was occupied by Canadian Pacif-ic Railway’s freight operations, but two years later, policies for the False Creek lands were approved by Vancouver’s city council.

The newest Concord Pacific Place project, Spectrum, is a $170 million, 32-storey retail/residential complex that opened in 2007 and includes a 147,000-square-foot Costco store and four highrise towers housing ap-proximately 1,000 residential units.

Power strugglesCommercialization of rivers energizes business, enrages environmentalists

1989-present

BC’s independent power plugged in as an industry in 1989 when the then-provincial government instructed BC Hydro to issue

calls for proposals for private power. But projects were initially slow to advance due to institutional iner-

tia, changing regulatory practices, sluggish domestic-electricity demand growth, and for some projects, the challenges in public perception and financing.

The election of the BC Liberals in 2001 changed much of that and brought a resurgence of interest in IPPs, especially as the province was increasingly becoming reliant on electricity imports. A year later, a new government energy plan was in place, with a major cornerstone being in-creased opportunities for private-sector investment.

Since 2001, Hydro has been buying electricity from independent power producers on an accelerated basis, mainly from run-of-river plants, which have rattled some environmentalists. But the industry has also seen in-terest from developers of everything from wind farms to biomass or bio-gas projects.

Courting aboriginalsLandmark Supreme Court of Canada rulings entrench rights and title

1990-1997

While aboriginal rights enjoy general constitutional protection, recent court decisions have both helped clarify the nature of ab-

original rights and redefined the legal relationship between B.C. and aboriginal people.

In particular, the courts have established tests for proving aboriginal rights and also aboriginal title, which, if proven, gives aboriginal people the right to exclusive use and occupation of the land in question.

One of the leading cases was R vs. Sparrow, a 1990 Supreme Court of Canada decision that aboriginal rights such as fishing that were in exist-ence when the constitution was enacted in 1982 are protected and cannot be infringed upon without justification.

In Delgamuukw vs. B.C. (1997) the Supreme Court of Canada made its most definitive statement on the nature of aboriginal title, saying that it’s a right to the land itself – not just the right to hunt, fish or gather – and that the government must consult with and may have to compensate First Nations whose rights are affected.

China’s bull runAsian giant’s development boom spurs resource demand

Early 1990s-2008

The liberalization of the Chinese economy and foreign investment helped fuel China’s industrialization in the early 1990s, taking the

Asian giant from virtual industrial-backwater status in the 1970s to a global economic force. China’s insatiable appetite for raw materials in turn helped start a new global-resource boom around 2005, with B.C.



m

❚ What prompted you to start Concert Properties?As is frequently the case in life, circumstance and opportun-ity prompted me to join with Jack Poole in the formation of Concert Properties Ltd. At the time, we were both working with BCE Development Cor-poration, which, in 1989, was acquired by Brookfi eld Prop-erties. Th is resulted in an op-portunity for me to join Jack in creating a new enterprise. I was very fortunate to be invit-ed by Jack to join him in start-ing Concert Properties Ltd. – the opportunity to work with an experienced and respected developer of the stature of Jack

Poole in creating a new real estate development and con-struction enterprise was too enticing to pass up, and the al-ternative off ered by Brookfi eld to relocate to Toronto didn’t fi t with my own circumstances and priorities at the time.

❚ What was the biggest challenge you faced in the fi rst year?Apart from organizing the company and raising the com-pany’s initial share capital from a variety of Canadian pension funds and business leaders who invested in our vi-sion, the biggest challenge was assembling a team that would

allow the company to move forward quickly with its fi rst developments. We were very fortunate to attract a highly skilled, very cohesive and tal-ented group of individuals who shared our vision for the development of Concert.

❚ What has been the most stressful business situation during the last 20 years?Th ere have been many challen-ges during the past 20 years, but again, supported by a compe-tent, dedicated and committed group of professionals, we have risen to virtually all challen-ges calmly and with good suc-cess. One of the most diffi cult decisions was a decision taken in January of 2007 – at a time when the industry was enjoying

unprecedented growth – to pull back and limit our continued expansion. Th is decision was taken mostly on an intuitive basis as we felt we were head-ed toward tougher economic times where it would be more diffi cult to support expansion and new initiatives. Th e subse-quent 24 months were agoniz-ing as we watched many of our peers and associates in the in-dustry continue to expand. In the end, however, this decision positioned Concert very well. We are on a very solid fi nancial base, we are not over-extended and we are now once again tak-ing on and securing new pro-jects in a more competitive and opportune environment. We are very excited about the fu-ture prospects for this company, community and province.

Vision C E O I N S I G H T S

Concert Properties high among Vancouver’s

David Podmore, Chairman and CEO, Concert Properties Ltd.

Having been among Vancouver’s most infl uential people within the real estate industry for more than three decades,

Concert Properties’ chairman and CEO David Podmore has been acknowledged for his tireless eff orts in giving back to the community, both personally and professionally. Involved in the development and acquisition of industrial and commercial properties, rental housing, multi-family condominium housing, resort developments and seniors living communities around British Columbia, Concert is a multi-faceted award-winning company. While the majority of his time may be spent identifying new business initiatives, Podmore also devotes signifi cantly to coaching and off ering encouragement and support to those within the company.



❚ How about the most gratifying?For me personally the most gratifying aspect of our busi-ness is the creation of people’s homes - whether these are homes for ownership or rent-al. An extension is Concert’s involvement in industrial and offi ce property development, as well as development and operation of seniors’ living communities. In all cases, we are creating homes for people to live in, services to support individuals through their life and places to work. Th is for me is the most gratifying as-

pect of the development busi-ness, and we take great pride in delivering outstanding product and supporting and delivering quality service to our clients.

❚ What anecdote from the last 20 years best illustrates your business attitude and success?Jack Poole, our chairman emeritus and co-founder of Concert Properties Ltd. since 1989, has been an outstanding mentor, coach and champion for Concert’s management team and myself personal-

1 9 8 9 / 2 0 0 9

most infl uential for two decadesly. Jack has unselfi shly shared his wisdom and drawn on his experience to coach and guide the continued develop-ment of the company. Jack is known to have many expres-sions that provide sage wis-dom in a non-intrusive and supportive manner. One of his best comments, on being presented with a new idea that may be a bit wild or off the wall, is “Let’s see if it survives the night.” Many times I’ve come to the offi ce aft er Jack has presented an idea or I’ve presented an idea that we’ve both cogitated

on the night before. We’d look at each other and say, “No, it didn’t survive the night,” in which case it was the end of discussion. Occasionally, of course, ideas do “survive the night” and we have many suc-cesses that are a testament to this.

❚ What would you do differently?I wouldn’t do anything dif-ferently, but I am so thank-ful that I didn’t miss the op-portunity to partner with Jack Poole and lead the formation of this company. <

’s



MILESTONES

providing some of its mineral and metal needs – everything from coal used to fire up its steel mills to copper, molybdenum and gold.

With millions of increasingly wealthy Chinese moving out of rural areas, the development boom opened up opportunities for B.C. forest-products companies, construction and engineering companies and other exporters of goods and services.

B.C. manufacturers, for decades reliant on its closest international neighbour – the U.S. – for much of their business, finally started to ride the China wave, but that came crashing down with the global financial meltdown of late 2008.

Food for thoughtCollapse of B.C. wild salmon stocks spawn heated debate

Early 1990s-2009

Wild sockeye salmon are disappearing from the Fraser River, and while numbers have been declining for decades, the unexplained

absence of millions during the 2009 run has experts baffled.With salmon returning to their spawning grounds in record low num-

bers, the finger of blame has been pointed just about everywhere – from pesticides and overfishing to rising river temperatures.

But as scientists and ecologists waded in with clues as to the missing millions, the net has also been cast over B.C.’s salmon farms, which have grown into an $800 million industry.

Farmed salmon has been the province’s top agricultural export for several years running but it’s also been blamed for infecting wild stocks with sea lice, as well as consuming them as fishmeal.

The salmon-farming industry, which employs 6,000 people both dir-ectly and indirectly, began with the first farm in 1971.

NDP’s second chanceMike Harcourt and Glen Clark lead the B.C. NDP to back-to-back election wins throughout the 1990s

1991-2001

The election of the B.C. NDP in 1991 and again in 1996 was a game-changer for many business leaders in the province. While mem-

ories of Dave Barrett’s NDP government of 1972 to 1975 were distant for most, many businesspeople felt the NDP’s lack of focus on the traditional strengths of the provincial economy and its taxation regime hurt invest-ment and restricted or reversed the fortunes of many businesses. Har-court’s resignation over the “Bingogate” scandal in 1995, and subsequent fiascos under his replacement, Glen Clark, including the fast-ferries de-bacle, the so-called “fudge-it budget” of 1996 and Clark’s own resigna-tion in 1999 saw the party fall out of favour with B.C. electorate. In 2001, the B.C. NDP led by Ujjal Dosanjh won only two seats out of 79.

Disappearing actsCompanies and brands that built B.C. in the 20th century now only a memory

1993-1999

The iconic Woodward’s, the retailer started by Charles Woodward, was among the first big brands to come and go in Vancouver. Open-

ing at the corner of what is now Main and Georgia Streets, the depart-ment store later moved to Gastown and became a famous city fixture with its giant rooftop “W” sign and 25-cent Days promotion.

Despite rapid growth through to the 1950s, marked by expansion across B.C. and Alberta, the company battled through the recession of the 1980s, went bankrupt in 1992 and was sold to the Hudson’s Bay Co. in 1993 – a century after its first Vancouver store opened its doors.

With roots going back to 1891, BC Telephone Co., later BC Tel, made its final call in 1999 when it merged with Telus, a telephone company operat-ing then in Alberta, after the deregulation of the phone industry.

With the merger the new Telus, now based in Vancouver, became the second-largest telephone company in Canada.



MILESTONES

Beetle botherB.C.’s Interior pine forests devastated

1996-present

There have been four large-scale outbreaks by the mountain pine beetle in B.C.’s pine forests over the past 85 years, but the latest one

first reported around 1996 is the largest ever seen in Canada.Though it’s just over six millimetres long – about the size of a grain of

rice – the tiny forest insect has infested 14 million hectares of B.C. forest, an estimated 630 million cubic metres of timber. About half of the lodge-pole pine in the timber-harvesting land base is affected to some degree by the beetle, which is expected to continue to kill lodgepole pine right out to the year 2020.

As it’s not possible to salvage all the beetle-killed trees for traditional uses such as making two-by-fours, other uses are being found for it, in-cluding as wood pellets to generate electricity, or biofuels.

B.C. finally wins Winter Olympic goldProvince to host first Olympic Games after trying for almost 50 years

1998-2003

Hosting a Winter Olympic Games had been a longtime provincial ambition. The idea first officially surfaced in 1961 with the forma-

tion of the Garibaldi Olympic Development Association (GODA) that proposed hosting the 1968 Winter Olympic Games at London Moun-tain, now better known as Whistler Mountain. It was unsuccessful. Again in 1965, GODA made a bid to be Canada’s candidate for the 1972 Winter Olympic Games. It lost out to Banff, which subsequently lost to Sapporo, Japan. In 1968, a joint bid with Vancouver was chosen as the Canadian candidate for the 1976 Winter Olympic Games, but when the 1976 Summer Olympic Games were awarded to Montreal, the bid was doomed. In 1974, Whistler was again considered as a candidate for the 1980 Winter Olympic Games, but the provincial government withdrew the bid. It tried again in 1979, but lost to Calgary, which was subsequently awarded the 1988 Winter Olympic Games. In 1998, Vancouver-Whist-ler was chosen as Canada’s candidate for the 2010 Winter Olympic and Paralympic Games.

In February 2003, 46% of Vancouverites (134,791) voted on whether they supported hosting the Winter Olympic Games if awarded by the IOC. Almost two-thirds (64%) supported hosting the Games, while 36% were in opposition. In July 2003, the International Olympic Committee selected Vancouver as the host city of the XXI Winter Games.

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MILESTONES

Forestry falloutConsolidation transforms B.C. forest landscape but leaves thousands jobless

1999-present

Only a handful of larger forestry companies remain after a wave of business combinations that picked up speed in 2004.

Gone are the big names of yesteryear – one-time industry giant Mac-Millan Bloedel Ltd., which was sold to Weyerhaeuser Co. in 1999, Slocan Forest Products (acquired by Canfor Corp.) and Doman Industries Ltd., a forest business started by legendary B.C. lumberman Herb Doman whose embattled $1 billion forestry empire fell to Western Forest Products Inc.

Toronto-headquartered Brookfield Asset Management Inc., formerly Brascan Corp., bought Weyerhaeuser’s B.C. coastal operations in 2005, leaving the U.S. company a shadow of its former self in B.C.

The period was also marked by the entry of funds in B.C. forestry – a Brookfield subsidiary that has a major stake in western and New York-based money-manager Third Avenue Management LLC has been buying into to various forest-products companies – and the loss of more than 25,000 jobs over the past decade.

B.C. Liberals return to powerAbsent for much of the past 50 years, Gordon Campbell’s B.C. Liberals now into third term

2001–present

After years in the political wilderness, former Vancouver mayor and official opposition leader Gordon Campbell and the B.C.

Liberals came to power in May 2001, after pushing the provincial NDP into near extinction by winning 77 of 79 seats, the largest majority ever in B.C. politics. In 2005, the Liberals won a second smaller majority winning 46 seats. In 2009, Campbell won 49 seats compared with the NDP’s 36 seats.

By the time the 2001 election was called, the NDP was on its third leader in five years. Scandals, challenging economic conditions and a re-gime considered unfriendly to business turned off supporters. Campbell and the Liberals were swept into office in a landslide.

Campbell used his majority to push through substantial tax cuts his first year in office, followed by severe cuts to government departments and social services in his second year. B.C.’s business community gener-ally welcomed Campbell’s more business-friendly approach to provincial politics and investment increased as global commodities prices and the general economy swung into more positive territory.

By 2004, the government tabled a balanced budget, and with a second balanced budget in 2005, the party won in the spring election although Campbell’s government was reduced to 46 seats while the NDP won 33. Campbell and the Liberals were elected to a third term in May 2009.



MILESTONES

Mercury risingClimate concerns generate green wave

Early 2000s-present

Al Gore’s critically acclaimed 2006 documentary An Inconvenient Truth may have helped raise public awareness of climate change

but B.C.’s environmental movement had been energized long before that.

The past decade, however, is significant for B.C. in that it opened up the province’s green economy and spawned a $1 billion clean-tech cluster that’s evolved into the third largest in the world.

Many of the approximately 100 B.C. clean-tech companies, some of whom are the fastest-growing businesses in the province, now operate on the global stage.

They’re involved in fuel cell development, alternative-energy technol-ogy, clean transportation, alternative fuels, energy efficiency, as well as water and wastewater and environmental technologies.

Government climate-change initiatives such as the carbon tax and legislated reductions in greenhouse gases have also helped fuel B.C.’s green-energy sector.

Contained growthContainerization sweeps into B.C. to take advantage of Asia-Pacific trade

2003-2009

More than $1.5 billion in port upgrades have been touted since 2003 to help local ports compete with U.S. ports and handle surging

container traffic from China.The new $170 million Fairview Terminal at Prince Rupert opened in

2007 and was hailed as the biggest thing to hit northwest B.C. since the Grand Trunk Pacific railway first reached the West Coast.

A $600 million expansion of Fairview is now planned while a $400 million expansion is nearing completion at Deltaport, the Port of Van-couver’s largest container terminal, which will increase capacity by up to 600,000 TEUs. Container capacity at TSI’s Vanterm terminal increased at the end of 2005.

After nearly 150 years of existing separately, the Fraser River, North Fraser and Vancouver port authorities combined in 2008 to become the Vancouver Fraser Port Authority, now known as Port Metro Vancouver, which handled nearly 115 million tonnes of cargo in 2008.

Building bridgesMultibillion-dollar Gateway project aims to ease regional congestion

2003-present

The Gateway program was established by the Province of B.C. in 2003 to improve the movement of people, goods and transit

throughout Metro Vancouver. The details were unveiled in 2006 and called for the spending of $3

billion to open up the province’s transportation network with three road- and bridge-improvement projects, which include widening Highway 1 and building a new toll bridge at the Port Mann crossing as well as up-grading interchanges.

Once completed by 2013, the project will also enable transit to cross the Fraser River for the first time in 20 years.

Gateway also encompassed building a new, 40-kilometre-long South Fraser Perimeter Road along the south side of the Fraser River.

The new route will directly link current port facilities, rail yards and industrial areas to highways 1, 91 and 99.



MILESTONES

Mining boomFortunes made and lost in notoriously cyclical commodities business

2006-2008

A commodities upswing driven by demand in China led to boom times for the global mining industry, and B.C. had its best year

ever in 2006.Six years ago before that, the industry was in a slump, but increasing

prices for base and precious metals carried net revenues and income of B.C. mining companies to levels not seen before.

Net income in 2006 rose 27.5% to $2.35 billion, eclipsing the $1.84 bil-lion in 2005, which was itself a record year.

For the first time, copper surpassed coal as the largest contributor to the B.C. industry’s net mining revenue.

The boom led to six million hectares of land being staked – a jump from almost one million hectares in 2005 – as well as record investments in exploration activities and industry employment. Things started to un-ravel somewhat in 2007, and, by the fall of 2008, the industry was once again in a slump.

B.C. swings back to deficit budgets as global economy sinksSlashed demand and prices for natural resources and energy crimp economic performance

2008-present

BC was unable to escape the economic downturn that washed ashore in the fall of 2008, as the U.S. sub-prime mortgage

crisis that started in 2007 spread to the highest reaches of the U.S. fi-nancial system. Major lenders faced massive defaults as a result of over-leveraging bad investments. The resulting credit freeze and collapsing U.S. construction market slashed B.C. forestry exports, reduced ener-gy and natural-resource demand, which, in turn, took a massive bite out of government revenues, and idled real estate development projects throughout the province as infrastructure and real estate development financing dried up. Consumer confidence and spending dropped as unemployment rose. While many financial analysts see signs of recov-ery in late 2009 and throughout 2010, the B.C. government was pushed back into deficit budgets for at least the next three years.



LIST

list




An artist’s eye Why: Parlayed a successful career in real estate to become one of B.C.’s biggest arts patrons

Michael AudainChairPolygon Homes

Michael Audain joined Polygon Homes in 1980 at the age of 43, after careers with Canadian Pacific Air Lines, as a juvenile probation officer and an agricultural economics consultant in the western U.S. Before Audain’s arrival, Polygon owned little more than an interest in a couple of apartment buildings. He resurrected the company, which today has built more than 18,000 homes throughout the Lower Mainland. His sphere of influence extends far beyond

real estate into the arts. Through the Audain Foundation, he is one of the largest benefactors of B.C. artists and, in particular, the Vancouver Art Gallery. He is current chair of the Vancouver Art Gallery Founda-tion.

Strictly commercialWhy: A consistent top performer in Vancouver’s commercial real estate space

Avtar BainsExecutive vice-president Colliers International Vancouver

A high-profile real estate guru in Vancou-ver, Avtar Bains is consistently at the top of Vancouver’s commercial real estate heap. He received his first big break in 1987, when he sold the former Daon Building in downtown Vancouver for $55 million. He has been on a role since then, brokering the sale of B.C. land-marks such as the HSBC Bank office tower in downtown Vancouver, which sold for $140 million in 2005. Bains brokered B.C.’s three biggest real estate

deals in 2002, including Ivanhoe Cambridge Inc.’s $143 million trans-action for Burnaby’s Metrotown Centre. Bains has completed more than $8 billion in transactions during his career.

Influential businesspeopleThey made our monthly business lists, received Top Forty Under 40 Awards and were recognized as influential women in business but, most importantly, they made the readers’ poll and editorial picks for our most influential business people of the past 20 years




Captain Capital Why: A chief architect in Howe Street’s development as a financial district

Peter BrownChairCanaccord Capital Corp.

Peter Brown founded Canaccord Capital in 1968 and steered the company to a public venture that generated more than $756 million before the current econom-ic downturn took hold.

Brown built Canaccord into Can-ada’s largest non-bank-owned invest-ment dealer, with 31 offices worldwide.

He served as vice-chair of Expo ’86, chaired the Vancouver Stock Exchange and the University of British Columbia and is on the board of the Fraser Institute

think tank and the Vancouver Organizing Committee of the 2010 Winter Olympic and Paralympic Games.

Pacific entrepreneur of the year in 2001 and 2002, Brown was chair of the B.C. Place Corporation and B.C. Enterprise Corporation, overseeing the sale of Expo ’86 assets. The B.C. Chamber of Commerce has named Brown its businessman of the year.

“A millionaire in no time”Why: Former B.C. NDP premier becomes a senior executive with B.C.’s biggest private company

Glen ClarkExecutive vice-presidentJim Pattison Group

Elected as an NDP MLA in 1986, former union-organizer Glen Clark rose quick-ly through the party ranks, serving as finance minister under former NDP premier Mike Harcourt. When Har-court resigned amid scandal in 1995, Clark replaced him.

Calling an election in 1996, his party narrowly won a majority of seats. He would resign as premier in August 1999 under an RCMP investigation over alleg-ations he received benefits from a friend

who hoped to gain a government casino licence. In October 2000, he was charged with criminal breach of trust. He was acquitted in August 2002.

B.C.’s wealthiest man, Jimmy Pattison, contacted Clark in June 2001 and hired him to operate the B.C. branch of Neon Products, which builds and maintains electric signs. Clark’s responsibilities have since reportedly grown to include many other Pattison Group divisions including Jim Pat-tison Lease, Canadian Fishing Company, Jim Pattison Sign Group and Ripley Entertainment. He is also president and CEO of News Group North America and a director for Sun-Rype Products Ltd. and Westar Group. Pattison reportedly liked Clark’s aggressive spirit the first time they met at a legislature reception in 1986. Pattison reportedly quipped afterward: “Send him to me. He’ll be a millionaire in no time.”

Minister of everythingWhy: An impressive career straddling public service provincially and federally, along with leading some of B.C.’s best-known corporate entities

David EmersonHolds numerous directorships

Between 2004 and late 2008, David Emer-son was a federal member of parliament and held several ministries, including industry, international trade with re-sponsibility for the 2010 Winter Olym-pics and the Asia Pacific Gateway Initia-tive, and foreign affairs. He was CEO of Western and Pacific Bank of Canada, as well as Canadian Western Bank. He was also president and CEO of the Vancou-ver International Airport Authority from 1992 to 1997 and president and

CEO of Canfor Corp. from 1998 to 2004. He was recently named to the board of Stantec Inc. and is also senior adviser to Farris, Vaughan, Wills & Murphy LLP. Emerson began his career as a member of the public service in 1972, serving as an economist with the Economic Council of Canada. He joined the B.C. public service in 1975, where he served in various roles, including deputy minister of finance, secretary to treas-ury board, deputy minister to the premier and secretary to cabinet.

Telecom team leaderWhy: Transformed B.C.’s largest public company into a national player

Darren EntwistlePresident and CEOTelus Corp.

Soon after Darren Entwistle took Telus’ reins in 2000, he spearheaded the largest corporate transaction in Canadian tele-communications history – a $6.6 billion merger with Clearnet Communications Inc.

Telus generated $9.7 billion in 2008 and had 36,600 employees.

Entwistle had spent seven years in senior positions with Cable and Wire-less, culminating with his appointment as president of Cable and Wireless (U.K.

and Ireland).In March 2009, Entwistle received the B.C. Community Achievement

Award for his contribution to philanthropic projects in British Columbia. He was recognized in 2008 by Investor Relations magazine with the award for best investor relations by a CEO.

He has also been honoured with the Queen Elizabeth II Golden Jubi-lee Medal, which recognizes Canadians who have made outstanding and exemplary contributions to the community and Canada as a whole.

He is on a number of boards including the Canadian Council of Chief Executives.




Mining mogulWhy: Transforming business success into philanthropy

Frank GiustraPresident and CEOFiore Financial

Most likely know Frank Giustra for donat-ing $100 million and half of his future earnings to the Clinton Guistra Sustain-able Growth Initiative and successfully encouraging other billionaires, such as Mexico’s Carlos Slim, to do the same.

Giustra’s philanthropy stems from business success.

Early success came at Yorkton Secur-ities where he became president, CEO and chair. He left to found and run Lions Gate Entertainment and capitalized on

Vancouver’s growing film industry until he cashed out in 2003.More success followed when he chaired Endeavour Financial, a mer-

chant banking firm that financed mining companies such as Wheaton River Minerals, which was sold to Goldcorp for more than $2 billion.

Talent-agency entrepreneur Sam Feldman introduced Giustra to for-mer U.S. President Bill Clinton and the two have become close friends.

B.C. biotech’s queen mumWhy: Co-inventor of the most successful drug ever commercialized by a B.C. company and co-founder of B.C.’s highly successful biotech QLT Inc.

Julia LevyDirector of Cannasat Therapeutics, Twinstrand Therapeutics and Tril-lium Therapeutics and adviser to numerous companies

As a former University of British Colum-bia professor of microbiology, with a doctorate degree in immunology, Julia Levy was a co-founder of QLT Inc. and was its chief scientific officer and vice-president, as well as president and CEO, from 1995 to February 2002.

A fellow of the Royal Society of Can-ada and former president of the Can-adian Federation of Biological Sciences, Levy was named an officer of the Order of Canada in 2001, the female entrepre-

neur of the year for International Business in 1998, Pacific Canada entre-preneur of the year in 2000 and winner of the Future of Vision Award from the Foundation Fighting Blindness in 2001.

In 2002 she received, along with David Dolphin, the Friesen-Rygiel prize for medical research and the Prix Galien Canada research award. Along with Gustav Huber of Novartis, she was presented with the 2003 Helen Keller Prize for innovation in eye care.

Louie LegacyWhy: Heads B.C.’s largest wholesale and retail empire

Brandt LouiePresident and CEOH.Y. Louie Co. Ltd.

Brandt Louie’s family-owned H.Y. Louie Co. Ltd. is one of B.C.’s largest privately owned companies. He is a scion of a family whose history in B.C. stretches back to the 1896, when grandfather Hok Yat Louie first arrived in Vancouver from China and established a store in Chinatown in 1903 to sell seed and fer-tilizer to Chinese farmers.

Louie’s business generates revenue from its IGA Marketplace grocery store chain of franchised and corporate stores,

the 69-store London Drugs chain, London Air Services, TLD Computers and Sonora Resort. He is a director of the Royal Bank of Canada, chancel-lor at Simon Fraser University and has been involved with organizations such as Duke University, the John F. Kennedy School of Government and the World Economic Forum.

Game-industry godfatherWhy: Mattrick’s Distinctive Software Inc. was the genesis of Vancouver’s billion-dollar video-game development scene and put the city on the map for gamers and techies worldwide

Don MattrickSenior vice-presidentInteractive entertainment business, entertainment and devices div-ision, Microsoft

In 1982, at the age of 17, Don Mattrick founded Distinctive Software Inc., which was later acquired by Electronic Arts Inc. (EA) in 1991 and subsequently became EA Canada.

Mattrick held various senior positions within EA, most recently as president of worldwide studios, until his resignation in February 2006. Mattrick began work-ing with Microsoft as an external adviser to the entertainment and devices div-ision in February 2007.

In July 2007, Mattrick officially joined Microsoft in his current role. He has served on the advisory board for USC School of Cinematic Arts and the province’s Premier’s Technology Council.

In 2003, Mattrick was named one of America’s top 10 influentials in Fortune magazine’s annual “40 Under 40” list for his contributions to Elec-tronic Arts’ expansion initiatives.




Retail play Why: A top Vancouver lawyer-turned-CEO who is now leaving her mark in retail and trade

Sue Paish CEOPharmasave

A former top lawyer at Vancouver’s lar-gest law firm, Sue Paish made a bold ca-reer change in 2007 by taking on the lead role of Langley’s Pharmasave Drugs. Between 2000 and 2006, she was Fasken Martineau’s Vancouver manag-ing partner, helping to expand the firm from one office and 130 lawyers to being part of a global legal giant with nine of-fices on three continents, 2,200 employ-ees, 500 lawyers and 250 partners. Her goal is to double Pharmasave’s 392 fran-

chised stores in five years. This year, she earned the historical distinc-tion of becoming only the fourth women to be named chair of the Van-couver Board of Trade.

Business billionaire Why: Owner of B.C.’s largest privately held company

Jim PattisonChair and ownerJim Pattison Group

Jim Pattison is B.C.’s most successful busi-

nessman thanks to his wholly owned stake in Canada’s third-largest private company. Pattison’s conglomerate gen-erates more than $6.7 billion in annual revenue and employs more than 31,000 staff. The Saskatchewan native started working as a car dealer, but expanded to broadcasting, out-of-home signage and grocery retail before the end of the 1960s. His diversified holdings are in 431 locations, which span the globe.

He is a director on several boards of companies where he holds a sig-nificant stake. He is also a director of BCE Inc., Bell Canada, Brookfield Asset Management, Telecast Canada and a trustee of the board of the Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation.

He was chair and president of the Expo 86 Corp., a position he ac-cepted for $1 per year.

His fishing buddies include ex-U.S. president George H.W. Bush and ex-British prime minister John Major.

Building VancouverWhy: As the go-to guy for major Vancouver projects such as the Vancouver Convention Centre expansion and the overhaul of BC Place, the co-founder of Concert Properties still shapes the city’s skyline

David PodmoreChair and CEO, Concert Properties Ltd. Chair, BC Pavilion Corp.

Vancouver-native David Podmore found-ed Concert Properties Ltd. back in 1989 with Jack Poole, current chair of VANOC. Podmore is vice-chair of the British Columbia Institute of Technol-ogy Foundation and a director of Tera-sen Inc. and Borealis BC Labs Inc.

He is a past-president of the Urban Development Institute Pacific Region, a past member of the BC Progress Board, past chair of the BC Children’s Hospi-tal Foundation and was a director of the

Canadian Tourism Commission for eight years. Podmore began his career in 1974 as a transportation planner in the

engineering department of the City of Edmonton. He returned to Van-couver in 1980 as vice-president of planning, design and engineering for the newly established BC Place Ltd. He was responsible for the urban-development plan that included acquiring the Expo or Pacific Place lands, developing a master infrastructure plan to guide development of the lands through Expo and subsequent urban development, and designing and implementing the plan. As the first president and CEO of BC Pavil-ion Corp., Podmore was also responsible for the development and oper-ation of the B.C. Pavilion at Expo ’86.

An Olympic-sized featWhy: Orchestrated Vancouver’s successful Olympics bid

Jack PooleChairVANOC

Despite building a reputation for integrity during the collapse of real estate de-veloper Daon Development Corp. in the 1980s, and despite having a lasting mark on the Vancouver skyline with such monuments as the Park Place tower and the Daon Building, Jack Poole will per-haps be best remembered as the orches-trator of Vancouver’s successful Olym-pics bid in 2003.

Poole has chaired Olympics organiz-er VANOC since Vancouver was award-

ed the Games in 2010. He remains chair of Concert Properties Ltd., a real estate development firm he co-founded in 1989. Before that, Poole built Daon into the second-largest real estate investment and development company in North America, before its collapse. He was appointed to the Order of Canada in 2006.



ca

❚ What prompted you to start your own business?When I was psychologically

tested at university, it was said

that I had an entrepreneurial

fl air. In later years, I had other

assessments, all of which also

mentioned this bent toward

being an entrepreneur. Aft er

about 20 years of corporate

life, I could no longer resist the

strong calling to fi nally pursue

this side of my personality and

I decided – whether I knew

how to or not - to try to run

my own business.

❚ What has been the most gratifying part?One of our long-term cli-

ents was facing unionization,

which they considered would

negatively aff ect their business.

It took a tremendous amount

of time to build a construct-

ive relationship between man-

agement and employees – re-

search, lobbying, relationship

building and communication

– but we were able to meet the

needs of both the employer

and the employees in a way

that allowed the workplace to

not require organizing a union.

Another situation was one in

which we restructured a mid-

sized food-processing com-

pany that was facing bankrupt-

cy, and we assisted to the point

that their business was success-

fully turned around and is still

in business today.

For the early ’90s, we took

some pretty creative consider-

ations which included tempor-

ary compensation and bene-

fi ts rollbacks; employees were

asked to take voluntary re-

duced work weeks; and we re-

designed jobs to allow for in-

creased effi ciencies. In fact, not

only were employees who were

originally laid off brought back

into full-time employment, but

the organization was able to

operate profi tably.

❚ What was the biggest challenge you faced in your fi rst year?Keeping my spirits up when

trying to develop my busi-

ness. Every day I went to a

little offi ce and spent eight

hours making call aft er call. I

went to networking and trade

events where people didn’t

really seem to want to hear

what I had to say, and I knew

I needed to persevere. Finally,

someone invited me to make

a sales call.

I asked my friends in sales,

“What do I do?” and got ad-

vice like “You must close the

sale before you leave” and

“Ask for the business.” At the

end of my presentation I re-

membered their advice so I

said, “Will you allow me to

do this work for you? I feel I

could do a great job.” When

they said yes, I almost fell off

my seat!

Vision C E O I N S I G H T S

The Fifth Option: Helping make the most of human

Michael Povey, Managing Director, The Fifth Option Consulting Inc.

Founded in 1989 and now boasting

approximately 150 years of cumulative

experience with captains of industry among a

variety of businesses and corporate models across four

continents, Th e Fift h Option helps companies deal with

a wide range of people related challenges from training

new employees to assessing their performance, setting

salary levels, dealing with confl ict and performance

issues, to hiring top talent and dealing with your union.

Th e Fift h Option creates an indelible link between one’s

business practice and the company’s profi tability.

As Managing Director, Michael Povey brings a wealth

of experience and personal expertise in maintaining key

contributions within the workforce through the eff ective

management of human capital.



❚ What approach from the past 20 years best illustrates your business attitude and success?

“Never, never give up”

– Winston Churchill.

Th ere are always solutions to

even the most extreme prob-

lems. Be persistent to fi nd the

details you need to appropri-

ately problem solve. Collect

and analyze all the appropriate

information before making an

assessment. It is important to

use theory as well as personal

relationships to properly man-

age yourself through even the

most diffi cult of situations.

❚ What has been your most stressful business situation during the last 20 years?Th e emotional or human side

of downsizing organizations.

Whether for clients, or as I

had to do for Th e Fift h Op-

tion back in the ’80s during

the last economic recession, it

is never easy to aff ect the lives

of others in such a founda-

tional way.

Th at being said, many posi-

tive outcomes came as a result

of downsizing: fi nancial turn-

around for organizations, an

opportunity for laid-off em-

ployees to fi nd a revitalized or

new calling and an opportun-

ity to demonstrate corporate

integrity and goodwill dur-

ing diffi cult times for the local

community and beyond.

❚ What advice would you give to someone embarking on their own business in this economic climate?Be clear on what you are sell-

ing: what is so unique about

your product or service? Th en

you’ve got to test the market.

You can do surveys or have

discussions with potential cli-

ents. Th ey may be able to iden-

tify what’s the hottest item on

your shelf. You can also ask if

they consider what you’re sell-

ing to be realistic. You need

to fi nd out if you can deliver

on their requirements. You’ve

also got to determine whether

you have an “entrepreneurial

fl air.” You might be exception-

al at delivering the service, but

can you convince the poten-

tial client to buy? Once you’ve

done all this, write a good

business plan. Th is is far more

important during poor eco-

nomic times. <

Celebr atingThe Fifth Option’s

strategic advantage

As the worst days of the down-turn fade into the past, organ-

izations are asking, “How do we position effectively for an upturn?” Firms that have scaled-down in size may not have the inclination or resources to hire a full time human resource manager. At the same time, small to mid sized firms need to avoid having their senior manager’s time cannibalized by a multitude of people-headaches.

Often, in small firms, the HR function typically goes to a CFO or Controller. These individuals may not have the background in strategic human resources to deal with “sticky” human resource issues or may be so swamped in their main role that HR goes to the back-burner.

Many firms are now discovering the strong business case for out-sourcing their HR. Enter The Fifth Option Consulting Inc. - a firm with a 20 year track record helping organizations run more profitably through effective human resource management.

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Condo kingWhy: He spearheaded the successful marketing strategy of pre-sales and has been involved in many of Vancouver’s largest residential condo projects

Bob RenniePrincipalRennie Marketing Systems

Bob Rennie’s Rennie Marketing Systems regularly racks up annual real estate sales between $1.2 billion and $2 billion. He spearheaded the marketing strategy of selling pre-sales and has recently represented major Vancouver condo projects such as Woodward’s, Shangri-La Hotels and Resorts, Fairmont Pacific Rim and the Olympic Village.

He increasingly acts as a developer’s representative and is involved in many aspects of projects, including concept,

zoning, architecture and design.He works regularly with other notable Vancouver developers such as

Peter Wall and Ian Gillespie and his company’s activity has spread to Ed-monton, Toronto, Dallas and Seattle.

The BlackBerry addict is an ardent supporter of the arts and is build-ing an office and an art gallery in Chinatown to house one of Canada’s largest private art collections.

Rennie has attempted to influence municipal elections by buying full-page political advertising in daily newspapers.

Biotech bellwetherWhy: A leading supporter of B.C.’s biotech sector and the founder of the province’s biggest medical testing lab

Don Rix ChairLifeLabs Diagnostics BC Inc.

Don Rix built MDS Metro Laboratories into one of the province’s largest private health-care providers before selling what is now known as Lifelabs to the Ontario Municipal Employees Retire-ment System (OMERS). He also found-ed and chairs Burnaby’s CanTest Ltd.

He sits on the Premier’s Technology Council and is well known for being an early investor in QLT Inc. among other successful B.C. life-sciences companies.

The past president of the Vancouver Medical Association has chaired the Vancouver Board of Trade, been inducted into the Business Laureates of British Columbia Hall of Fame and is member of both the Order of British Columbia and the Order of Canada.

The avid volunteer, philanthropist and angel investor has mentored countless young entrepreneurs.

Carole knows bestWhy: Experience working at the highest echelons of provincial and federal government and holding a host of corporate, non-profit directorships

Carole TaylorFormer B.C. finance minister and MLA; chair of the federal finance minister’s economic advisory council and governor of the Vancouver Board of Trade

Torontonian Carole Taylor married for-mer Vancouver mayor Art Phillips, co-founder of Phillips, Hager & North, in the 1970s, and would later gain experi-ence on Vancouver city council as an alderman and as the chair of the Van-couver Port Corp., Canada Ports Corp., Vancouver Board of Trade and the Can-adian Broadcasting Corp.

She has served on the boards of HSBC Holdings (London), Canfor and Fair-mont Hotels, among others. She was re-

cently named to the board of the TD Tank Financial Group and senior ad-viser for Borden Ladner Gervais. She stepped down from the CBC to run for public office and was elected to the provincial legislature in May 2005. She announced she would not run again in the 2009 provincial election and resigned in December 2008 to advise the federal government.

A Golden career Why: A prolific miner whose career has spanned more than 25 years

Ian TelferChairGoldcorp Inc.

A wheeler and dealer in the mining in-dustry for 25 years, Ian Telfer has played major roles in financing, developing and operating mines in a dozen countries throughout the world. In the early 1980s, he co-founded TVX Gold Inc., a shell company that under Telfer’s leadership would grow into a gold producer with a market value of $1 billion.

In 2002, he became CEO of Whea-ton River Minerals Ltd. and, three years later, would engineer the sale of the Van-

couver upstart to Goldcorp Inc., creating the world’s lowest-cost million-ounce gold producer.

He retired as head of Goldcorp in 2006 after guiding the firm through the US$8.6 billion merger with Nevada’s Glamis Gold Ltd.


20Anniversary.indd 26 10/16/09 12:13:21 PM


Athletic apparel trend-masterWhy: As the mind behind athletic apparel powerhouse lululemon athletica inc., Chip Wilson’s vision of sportswear now has a global audience

Dennis “Chip” WilsonFounder, chair and chief product designerlululemon athletica inc.

In December 2005, Chip Wilson sold 48% of his interest in lululemon for $108 mil-lion. The University of Calgary econom-ics graduate had founded the company in 1998 after selling his skate-and-surf apparel shop Westbeach in 1997.

Lululemon subsequently went public in July 2007 and is now listed on stock exchanges in Toronto and New York. The first lululemon on West 4th Avenue in Kitsilano shared its retail space with a yoga studio. Its technical yoga clothes

and apparel are now at more than 100 stores across Canada, the U.S., Australia and Hong Kong. Wilson’s community involvement includes the Chip’s Not Dead Yet Memorial Mile fundraiser for the BC Children’s Hospital Foundation and his charity imagine1day, which supports pro-jects providing primary education for children in Ethiopia.

Dragon’s flare Why: A top banker and beacon of Vancouver’s Chinese community

Milton WongPresident and non-executive chairHSBC Global Asset Management (Canada) Ltd.

The eighth son of a Cantonese farmer who immigrated to Vancouver in 1908, Mil-ton Wong sold his firm, MK Wong and Associates, to Hong Kong Bank of Can-ada in 1996.

At that time, the firm managed al-most $2 billion in assets. With Wong at the helm, HSBC Asset Management grew to $218 billion in global assets by 2003.

Instrumental in the growth of S.U.C.C.E.S.S, the Chinese-Canadian answer to the United Way, Wong also es-

tablished the Vancouver International Dragon Boat Festival. He is a chancellor emeritus for Simon Fraser University, and an Order

of Canada and Order of British Columbia recipient.

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SUBSCRIBERS

George GodfreyGeneral manager, Fleming Decal and Sign

“Having had a prior relationship with Peter Ladner we did some decals for

Business in Vancouver in the early days,” re-calls George Godfrey of his early connection with the newspaper. “Of what I read, I par-ticularly like to find out who’s suing who; I had a customer who owed me a few grand and kept telling me that he had no money. When I read in BIV that he got some money, I phoned my lawyer and he went right after his bank account. That was the best phone call I ever made.” Through the years, the business has remained steady, according to Godfrey. “It’s like the Three Little Pigs,” he notes. “I’m the pig who built the brick house.”

Rick FeatherstonePresident, Tritech Machine

Another self-confessed “Day 1 guy,” Rick Featherstone has maintained a strong

loyalty to BIV over the years as he “enjoys a variety of stories that I find very informative to business; that, and it’s always good to see who’s being sued as it helps us in knowing who we may or may not be dealing with.” Tritech Ma-chine has experienced noticeable growth over its lifetime. “It has gone from a partnership situation, to where I bought my partners out, and we’ve grown exponentially from a three-man operation to a 20-man business, and been as high as 50.”

Shirley BroadfootPresident, Sierra Communications Ltd.

Shirley Broadfoot recalls starting her busi-ness back in 1980 and proudly states, “I’ve

been with BIV ever since. Whenever I didn’t get the chance to read a current issue, I would always later find out something that I wished I had read at the time. I find it keeps me abreast of what’s going on and it’s been important to me in my business; I felt it kept me connected to the people.” Sierra Communications “de-veloped very well in the ensuing years,” she says. Though still involved, “I sold it in 1993 and I’m basically retired now.”

Axel KriegerPresident, Microzip Data Corp.

Another early believer in BIV, Microzip Data president Axel Krieger notes that

among the various features, he enjoys focus-ing in to see whose being sued and by whom. “We find it particularly interesting and we’re always checking it to see if any of our clients are being sued,” he says. As for his own com-pany’s success, “it has basically grown and con-tracted over the years due to the fact that we’re not a one-stop shop. We’re a data-processing company and don’t provide mailing service. It’s like being a butcher shop as opposed to be-ing a supermarket – some people want a one-stop shop.”

Nils ThaysenPresident, United Carpet

“Peter Ladner and I used to belong to the same executive association a

number of years ago, and that’s how I came to be involved with Business in Vancouver basically right from the start,” says Thaysen, recalling how he found himself to be among the list of BIV’s earliest subscribers. Of the current state of United Carpets, “Our Com-pany has certainly grown some over the years; pretty steadily in fact. We deal pretty well with all products that have to do with any kind of flooring, including hardwood. We’ve certainly maintained in the areas of both retail and con-tract applications.”

Darlene SandersPresident, Avant Gardner

“I jumped onboard as a subscriber pretty much when the paper first came to be,”

recalls Sanders of her introduction to Business in Vancouver. “I remember that because I had just started my own business as a retailer and I wanted to know as much as I could find out about the business world. As for what she most enjoys from BIV, “I pretty much enjoy it all, even if a lot of it doesn’t apply to me specifically – I still find it pretty interesting to read.

“Business life has been good with some ups and downs,” she notes, “but I truck along.”

Twenty-year subscribersNo publication can survive without its readers, and the success of Business in Vancouver is in no small way the result of dedicated subscribers. Many of them have been getting BIV delivered to their mailboxes since our first publication. Below are a handful of 20-year subscribers



SUBSCRIBERS

Rudy NielsenPresident, Niho Group

As one of B.C.’s largest private owners of recreational property and a leading ex-

pert in recreational real estate with over 35 years of experience, the Niho Group has been a subscriber for the past two decades. “I knew Peter Ladner and knew that BIV was going to be a great way of keeping us informed and current on what is happening in various busi-ness circles,” says Nielsen. “Within the past 20 years, our business has grown from one com-pany to three companies and we’ve done that by staying innovative and by developing new ideas to keep our companies flourishing.”

Robert MatthewsMatthews Campbell Chartered Accountants

Maintaining a strong presence in the Bur-naby and Vancouver areas since 1976,

Robert Matthews says, “This was the first pub-lication that produced articles on small busi-ness in Vancouver. I’ve always been interested in the stories of those businesses that started small and grew to mid-sized businesses. These success stories should be the ones told as they will promote others to take the risk associated with being self-employed. Too often we hear the stories of the same big-business owners. There is nothing wrong with this except that there are thousands of successful small busi-nesses whose stories should be told.”

Julie MarzolfPrincipal, Marzolf and Associates

Consultants in public relations, research and implementation of communication

strategies, Julie Marzolf ’s reasons for her BIV relationship were threefold: “I wanted a peri-odical with a local focus on business; I like Peter Ladner’s approach and I was friends with a columnist,” she says. “Since our business is locally based and highly relational, having a sense of what is going on in the community serves us well. BIV, being timely and local, is an important component of our overall media-monitoring strategy.” Since Inception, Marzolf and Associates “have increased in our ability to offer the best communications counsel and services to our clients.”

Paula KeatsVice-president, Vivid Graphics Ltd.

“We’ve been around 25 years,” says Keats, “and our involvement with

BIV goes right back to the beginning. I saw Peter Ladner every week and knew what he was involving himself with so I jumped on-board right away and found it’s been a good resource for our company. It keeps us informed of events and happenings around Vancouver and it’s certainly helped us generate a number of leads over the years.” Offering a variety of services, Vivid Graphics has noticed “a very steady business over the years and has since turned worldwide with a number of our clients now in the U.S.”

Mark StartupPresident and CEO, Shelfspace (formerly Retail BC)

“I’ve been a subscriber for so long I hon-estly can’t remember,” Mark Startup

recalls. “In fact, it’s been a part of my week for a very long time. The stories I’ve liked are too numerous to mention but I really enjoy the columnists and the one that I’ve probably read and retained the most over the years is [Jef-frey Gitomer]. I find the regular contributors offer high-quality and relevant content, and my week wouldn’t be complete without Peter Ladner. Retail BC has grown exponentially and has changed dramatically over two significant rebrandings.”

Elsbeth TurnerSecretary, UBS Bank Canada

Likened to that of the most powerful two-person financial firm in the world, UBS

Bank Canada is a world-leading wealth-man-agement company, global-investment bank and asset-management business. Having been on board with Business in Vancouver since its first edition, Turner says, “The publication has provided good business information, which has helped with our marketing efforts.” Over the last 20 years, UBS Bank Canada has no-ticed a tremendous increase in assets under management and within the past seven years, has grown from a team of five employees to 14 highly qualified financial professionals dedi-cated to meeting the needs of wealthy clients.

Eric MartinVice-president, Bosa Development Corporation

Working hard at envisioning the future in residential and commercial develop-

ment, Bosa Development Corporation has enjoyed more than four decades of success. It has delivered tens of thousands of new homes across the continent since Nat Bosa started the company. “We’ve been a subscriber for years and enjoy reading BIV for a weekly overview of local business news, especially in the areas of real estate and construction,” says Eric Martin. “Over the years, the Bosa Development Cor-poration has grown substantially, but, more importantly, it’s diversified itself in terms of geographic locations and our business focus.”

Brian McGavinDirector of marketing, MacDonald Development Corporation

Raising equity financing for MacDonald De-velopment Corporation, a company suc-

cessful in developing, investing in and managing real estate since 1982, marketing director Brian McGavin acknowledges that, “We’ve been on board with BIV forever and have found it’s been helpful to us in the sense that it keeps us current by choosing topical subjects as well as provides us with good general information.” During the past two decades, the company has been active across North America, including most major Canadian cities, the B.C. Interior and Vancouver Island, as well as major centres in the United States.

Santo SandhuInvestment adviser, Wolverton Securities Ltd.

A family-based western Canadian business since 1910, Wolverton Securities offers a

wide range of financial services and products through a network of more than 100 invest-ment advisers. “We became a subscriber of BIV because it was something different,” notes Santo Sandhu. “We find that it’s focused more on the various business aspects and it certainly makes us more aware of what’s happening within the various sectors of the economy and keeps us informed of new ideas coming out all the time. Our business has grown several fold over the past two decades.”



SUBSCRIBERS

Bill DixVice-president international, BC Bearing Engineers Ltd.

Representing over 200 manufacturers and with 26 locations in Western Canada, BC

Bearing Engineers has been one of the earliest supporters of Business in Vancouver. “The pub-lication certainly keeps us current within the business environment, and after all, that’s the primary benefit of being a reader in the first place,” says Bill Dix. A group of companies of-fering bearings, power transmissions, material handling, electrical and allied industrial prod-ucts and services to a broad base of industries located throughout North and South America, BC Bearing Engineers “has grown substan-tially within the past two decades – certainly internationally.”

Mac CampbellPresident, Mac D Campbell Associates Inc.

Despite its location in the southeast corner of British Columbia, Mac Campbell still

became an early believer in Business in Vancou-ver, having been part of the group helping Peter Ladner raise the initial capital. “BIV is by far the best source for business information in the province and in terms of us here in Kimberley, it gives us the opportunity to see legal issues in-volving folks in the East Kootenays.” For those looking to venture into their own business, Campbell advises, “Study thoroughly, plan as much of the detail as you can in advance and get lots of peer-group input into it.”

Sharon BortolottoPrincipal and founder, BBA Design Consultants Inc.

As a full-service interior-design company in the areas of hospitality, resorts and

multi-family residences, BBA Design Consult-ants Inc. counts itself among the lengthy list of Business in Vancouver’s longtime subscribers. “We find it keeps us in touch with what’s hap-pening,” says Bortolotto, who notes she par-ticularly enjoys the columns and articles that offer advice to businesses. “We’ve been in busi-ness ourselves since 1985, and BIV continually helps us keep abreast of what our clients are do-ing. We’ve developed quite well over the years and built up a solid and steady design firm.”

Glenn ChalmersVice-president, local sales, Astral Media Radio

Returning to Vancouver hoping to con-nect with the city’s business aspects to en-

hance his familiarity in 1993, Chalmers began his BIV subscription. “It gave me access that helped speed up the process, allowing me view-points on a number of industries and business categories that aren’t part of my daily work.” Radio, like most industries dealing with the speed of information access and flow, remains part of the daily routine of the majority of Canadians. “These days, we simply use it dif-ferently than 20 years ago,” says Chalmers. “The challenge we face today is identifying and adapting when change happens as quick-ly as it does.”

Greg WhittakerGeneral manager, Swisco Installations Ltd.

Being another of Business in Vancouver’searliest subscribers, Swisco Installations’

Greg Whittaker explains that his interest in the publication was borne largely out of the fact that it was locally based business news. “That’s why I’ve stuck with it ever since,” he says. “It’s been a very effective paper to us over the years. I enjoy the legal section and tech columns but I also enjoy seeing two opposing views to a par-ticular subject.” Over the course of the past two decades, as a wholesale distributor to the construction industry, Whittaker notes that Swisco has experienced continued growth. “Volume-wise, we’re up.”



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business in vancouver 20th anniversary commemorative issue

Documents

forestry fallout1999present

lower mainland1986present

power struggles1989present

beetle bother1996present

building bridges2003present

vancouver bill vander

premier issue of business

bill dix