Aliant Business Pitch Challenge a Success!

Every year a business pitch competition is held in Saint John - it's an opportunity for budding entrepreneurs to pitch their product/idea to community business leaders, receive feedback on their idea and presentation and in the case of the competition winner, gain a little start up cash.

This year’s competition, sponsored by Aliant and presided over by both big business executives and small business owners, was in my humble opinion a resounding success! Competitors road in a limo with three judges and had five minutes to make their pitch and answer questions. So if anyone in Saint John was wondering why they saw the same two limos rounding the Uptown area over and over and over again, now you know.

There were almost thirty competitors this year – some with product samples in tow and others brought full blown cheering sections to pump them up during the down time. But what down time? Sebastian Café, this year’s venue, was absolutely packed when I walked in. And the energy was sizzling – people were excited about the competition, having a great time networking and meeting up with old acquaintances. At one point someone from the crowd even grabbed the mic and sang “Irish Eyes” and a Rat Pack song that escapes me at the moment… only in Saint John!
Congratulations to this years winners – the judges were so impressed with all of the finalists they decided on a three-way tie for first – and to the organizers, hosts and volunteers who made it happen. And a special congratulations to every contestant who had the guts to step up and compete in a nerve-wracking but very worthwhile experience!

Zen in the City Centre

As a result of holding the launch party for Saint John Life on Your Terms at the Yoga Outlet, I was invited by Jenna and Jay (owners) to take my first official yoga class. Aside from a few poses a girlfriend of mine taught me ages ago this was to be my first intro to this form of exercise.

I didn’t really have any expectations walking in, so I was really surprised to find that after the first ten minutes of class I was shaking like a leaf with the exertion of holding the poses and staying balanced… and reminding myself to keep breathing! The hour absolutely flew by and during the last five or ten minutes of relaxation in the “Deadman’s Pose” I almost fell asleep. Now that’s my kind of exercise!

A couple of words of advice to other yoga rookies out there:

• Wear form-fitting clothing so you don’t expose yourself during the “Downward Dog” and a few other poses
• Introduce yourself to your neighbours as a rookie so they’re more comfortable with you watching how they complete their poses (avoid being a creepy person)
• For the love of Mike, DON’T FORGET TO BREATH!

Wildlife Sightings - Spring is Here!

You'd never know it based on the snow flying outside, but spring has arrived in Saint John. I can say this with confidence because all of a sudden every local animal you could think of is out and about, and most of them are travelling in pairs.

This weekend my partner and I took a drive up the river to look at a property we're interested in (by the way, if anyone has waterfront or waterview property for sale please let me know!). It was a gorgeous sunny day and as usual the water sparkled, reflecting perfectly the still-bare tree limbs that are coated in ice and resemble Christmas tinsel.

The day was so perfect we decided to take the long way home which includes a couple of ferry rides - here's a list of the birds and beasts we saw on our two hour cruise:

• My first robin of the season... spring really is here! Although he flew right out in front of the car and we just missed him - we almost killed spring!


• Canadian geese with goslings (I didn't know they hatched so early)


• A very unusual small flock of water fowl that seemed to be nesting on ice floating in the middle of the river - if anyone can hazard a guess I'd be interested to know what they were


• More deer than I could count


• More molting bald eagles that I've ever seen in one day!


• An unidentified eagle being harried by some crows - huge bird, flying solo... may have been a golden eagle but he flew behind the trees before we could get a close look


• A white hare...


• ...who unforunately met his match in the fox we saw just moments later.

Life on Your Terms in Korean, Chinese & Spanish!

Saint John Life on Your Terms is going multinational! Over the course of this year we'll be working hard to present the portal in Korean, Chinese and Spanish to showcase our community and our great stories in those languages. To my knowledge, this initiative is another Saint John First - are there other communities presenting themselves to the world in five languages?

To ensure we're doing this properly we've enlisted the help of groups of volunteers representing each language to guide us in the translation, content and design of the mirror sites. I am very grateful to the members of our Korean Advisory Committee for the work that they've helped us with to date, and I look forward to more of the same with our Spanish and Chinese Advisory Committees!

There is still time to participate in this exciting initiative. If you are interested in volunteering with one of our Advisory Committees please feel free to contact me!

Tim Hortons Marketing Secrets

This year the CNIB Vision Dinner featured the presentation "Tales from Under the Rim: the Marketing of Tim Hortons" by Ron Buist. I must admit I was very excited to hear this presentation as Roll up the Rim is one of my first choices when I think of a successful marketing campaign (right up there with Madonna... you don't have to enjoy her music to appreciate her brilliance in marketing).

Unfortunately there were not a lot of secrets revealed - more of a history of the organization from a marketing perspective, which was interesting enough in it's own right I suppose.

Anyway thanks to CNIB for a nice dinner and networking opportunity, and I hope the work of your staff and volunteers to put the event together paid off!

Third Tuesday comes to Saint John

I attended the second meeting of Third Tuesday in February... hosted at the Opera Bistro (translation: awesome food, good wine, great atmosphere) this networking event is an opportunity for those in the fields of communications, PR and marketing, to get together with the computer geeks of the world (please note I use that term with a lot of admiration, respect and maybe even a bit of awe - who knew a string of zeros and ones could do such cool things?) to learn about electronic marketing techniques and meet the people who can make such things work. And the mix of attendees is great - programmers, PR pros, established business leaders and entrepreneurs... stunningly enough I was not the least technically inclined person in the room!

I understand this network is a rarity in Canada - Saint John is in the company of major urban centres like Vancouver and Toronto, and has kept pace with those players (Montreal's Third Tuesday group started at the same time). Just another example of how our "quaint little town" continues to be an early adopter and innovator, true to our history!

Sea Dogs + Rescue Dogs = Fun!

I had the unique opportunity to volunteer as a dog handler for the Animal Rescue League at, of all places, a Sea Dogs hockey game. I was excited about the exposure the organization would get at the event, but have to admit also a little leary about bringing shelter dogs to such a frenetic environment. But never-the-less myself, a handful of other volunteers, three cats and two dogs trudged through the snow to Harbour Station for the game...

I will never cease to be surprised by the resiliency of animals. In an open environment, surrounded by strangers who have little to no doggy manners, horns and bells and other noise makers sounding like crazy, the odd loose puck... and not a single incident. In fact one pooch was so relaxed we thought we'd need a crane to get her up off the floor.

My thanks to the members of our community who came over to visit us, made donations to the shelter and share their own pet stories. An extra special thank you and congratulations to the new parents out there who have since adopted every single animal we brought with us! And thanks to the Sea Dogs for inviting us and helping us gain critical exposure for our work.

By the way - I missed most of the game but the Dogs won... I hope they can keep it up for the playoffs!

Tea by the Sea

In early February I was in the Village of St. Martins (home of the famous Sea Caves and gateway to the Fundy Trail) for a couple of meetings. In January I was contacted by a Village resident inviting me to visit her Tea Room and discuss the Booktown initiative in the community.

There are a couple of reasons why I'm blogging about this - first and foremost is the impressive east coast hospitality! Jackie had read my earlier blog entry about travelling and eating out as a Celiac and immediately offered to make me a gluten-free chocolate cake. I expected, at best, a store bought cake as hard as cardboard and just as flavourful. But I was pleasantly surprised by amazing homemade soup with gluten free bread for dipping, a boat-load of tea (50+ varieties on site I believe) and a true homemade chocolate cake.

Over the course of a very leisurely lunch Jackie and Eric filled me in on the Booktown concept (www.booktown.net) and the challenges of being a "Senior-preneur". Watch for a feature article on Jackie & Eric and their unique tea room/book store this spring!

Life on Your TV

Saint John Life on Your Terms was featured on Rogers First Local and Daytime TV shows in January and February. Thank you to everyone who tuned in and subsequently contacted me to suggest changes and additions to our community information portal (www.saintjohnlifeonyourterms.ca). A special note of appreciation goes to Margret Kennedy's hubby - Margret was our first "Work on Your Terms" feature and agreed to be interviewed for First Local, and apparently almost every aspect of her life made the cut except for him!

House of Languages make SJ feel like home

On January 28th the Saint John Free Public Library officially opened it's newly expanded "House of Languages". The "House of Languages" is a large collection of books, magazines and other reference material in a number of languages other than English, including French, Korean, Chinese, Spanish, Hindi, etc. for loan through the library.

This project was borne of nessecity as the National Library of Canada stopped circulating mult-lingual texts in the 80's. So the Saint John Library, with the support of a significant donation from the Skinner Family Foundation and the help of a large group of volunteers representing each language group, took the initiative to develop their own collection.

I had the opportunity to chat with a few of these volunteers at the 0pening event, and discovered the importance of this collection to new immigrants in our community. To read - for pleasure or purpose - in your first language is something I had completely taken for granted. Of course I would feel more "at home" in a community that provided me with cookbooks from my home country for instance, or my recognized national newspaper so I can get all the news from the home I had just left.

Congratulations to the Saint John Library, their staff and volunteers who put a tonne of work into a project that will help immigrants in our community feel welcome and at home!

A Month & A Half in a Paragraph

Although you'd never know it from this blog, Saint John has been hopping through the worst part of winter. So busy in fact that all I've been able to keep up with is a few notes on the events and activities I've experienced through February, with the intention to sit down "some time in the very near future" to blog about them. So I'll do my best in the next few posts to summarize some of the more noteworthy experiences of the month...