Where have all the cowboys gone?

“This could be bloody. How’s your stomach?” asks Mike Rose, ranch manager of Quilchena Cattle Co. Ltd., as we approach the red bull corseted by a steel cage and three cowboys in fringed chaps, smeared with blood.

Cow boss Miles Kingdon clamps a wrench-like device around the bull’s testicles and muscles down on them while the other cowboys steady the squirming 270-kilogram yearling that somehow managed to avoid the typical one-month-old castration. With the placement of his testicles on a fence stump, alongside two others, the Hereford-Angus cross is now officially a steer. more...

Tiny tugs

Growing up in Tofino, Ron Burchett used to drive the shipyard workers crazy asking questions about the boats they worked on. To keep him busy, they’d give him blocks of wood and tell him to carve his own.

“Then they realized I had some sort of talent,” he says, “but they weren’t sure what the hell to do with me.” more...

Round table: All together now

In this pre-Olympic age, the term megaproject has new meaning in B.C. Notice how the phrases Canada Line, Sea-to-Sky and Port Mann twinning have a different ring to them than, say, fast ferries? One of the major differences is public-private partnerships, or P3s.

It’s a concept born in the U.K. for handing major responsibilities of public projects to private companies, and in Canada no province has done more than B.C. In fact, when Nova Scotia wanted advice this spring on which infrastructure projects to pursue as P3s, it paid $200,000 for B.C.’s opinion.

And yet P3s are like a recipe book for how to inflame our Left Coast sensibilities: public services entrusted to private companies, tax dollars fuelling corporate profits, unionized public workers excluded from provincial works, multinationals bidding against B.C. companies. more...

Suburban walking blues

Let me get this out of the way right up front: I am an American. I have been visiting Vancouver for years, most recently on a beautiful spring day last April to give a speech sponsored by UBC and SFU. On the same day, I took a tour of Metro Vancouver’s walkable neighbourhoods with folks from Smart Growth BC, getting a first-hand experience of what it’s like to walk and take public transit in this region.

I must also mention that since Vancouver is widely considered to be one of the most walkable, livable and vital cities on the planet, it is with great humility that I comment on a place that is much more vital than nearly any U.S. city.

But I will comment, because I want to encourage Vancouver to continue to offer the U.S. a model of walkable urban development that we need so badly. more...

Learning to walk, wirelessly

Recently, Ascalade Communications Inc., a Richmond maker of digital wireless and communications products, filed for bankruptcy protection under the Companies’ Creditors Arrangement Act.

Ascalade – which makes wireless phones and other devices – was one of the bigger players in a B.C. wireless scene that’s been exploding of late, with an ever-increasing number of competitors. While it appears Ascalade’s troubles are bigger than those of its competition, they are emblematic of the sector. more...

Off-roader

Kellee Irwin Senior VP, insurance, marketing and underwriting, ICBC

I’m not what people expect for a vice-president for underwriting: spiky-red-haired biking chick. But the motorcycle business is very dependent on insurance! I’ve been in the business for 20 years now and biking for almost 40. more...

The inheritance problem

When the executor read out the terms of their father’s will, Julia and her two siblings just stared at each other in stunned silence. “We were completely shocked,” recalls the Vancouver marketing specialist. “My dad had done his best to control us while he was alive – now he was doing it from the grave.”

What they expected to be a simple three-way division of their dad’s considerable estate turned out to be a complex set of instructions, sending his adult children cap in hand to his executor any time they needed a little extra cash to cover unusual expenses such as new vehicles, home renovations or weddings. more...

Jay Garnett

As the head of a brand-management company, you must take your appearance pretty seriously. Oh yeah, I do. You’ve got to look good to be successful and feel successful. How would you say you brand yourself then? I think it’s not what you wear but how you present what you wear. So I don’t wear a lot of loud clothing. Nothing overly trendy, nothing offensive, but I’m not “white shirt, black suit” either. Where did you pick up this outfit? It’s a Barneys New York suit, Italian wool. The shirt and tie are both Harry & Sons, which is an Italian shirt-maker, but they don’t have it in North America. I get most of my clothes when I travel, so I get shirts and ties from around the world. Is that a bracelet on your wrist? more...

Greener pastures

A couple of years ago, most tree huggers were out in the wilderness, yelling to be heard. Now many are cozied up in the boardrooms of Canada’s most powerful advertising and financial corporations. Or, excuse me, that should read: many triple-bottom-line sustainability consultants have now formed strategic alliances with brand-management and strategy firms.

Does this kind of doublespeak prove that sustainability has finally arrived? Or does it simply show that the new greenwashing machines are spinning faster than ever? The most recent, and possibly biggest, example is Echology, a partnership launched in April between Junxion Strategy and Palmer Jarvis DDB, a multinational advertising firm headquartered in Vancouver. more...

Goodbye workdays

In 1543, two Portuguese adventurers carrying primitive rifles arrived in Japan aboard a Chinese cargo ship. The weapon was new to the Japanese—they began manufacturing firearms and within 40 years had more and better guns than any other country. After a few decades, however, guns disappeared from Japan entirely. Why? The Samurai didn’t care for change; they wanted to keep their swords.

There are a good number of people—your scribe included—who might be considered the samurai of the 21st century. more...