Saskatchewan NOW! } SPRING 2017 1...continued on page 8

www.economy.gov.sk.ca Volume 34 } SPRING 2017Saskatchewan’s quarterly newsletter on people and business engaged in economic growth

Caitlin Olauson co-owns and operates a com-pany that produces tasty and healthy snackbars using locally sourced produce such aslentils, flax, saskatoon berries and quinoa (yes,Saskatchewan produces quinoa). And she saysher experience with e Local Bar shows thatthere’s great opportunity and support inSaskatchewan for other entrepreneurs whobelieve in a buy local approach to business.

“I think it’s important to have a connectionto your food and where it comes from, to

know what’s in it and who made it,” saysOlauson, who comes from a farming familyand operates Olauson Food Products inSaskatoon with her sister Julie.

“It seems like such a big, missed opportunityto be shipping produce across the world andbuying it back as finished product.”

She says Saskatchewan has the infrastructure,incentives, support services and people to helpturn ideas for food products into reality. “I’m

continually amazed by how often people arewilling to sit down and have a coffee and justtell you everything they know about socialmedia, or about building a website, or howthey did this or that to start up their ownbusiness,” says Olauson. “I thought it wasgoing to be a mean and scary business worldout there, but people are just really helpful.”

Olauson got her taste for entrepreneurialismwhile studying food science at the Universityof Saskatchewan’s College of Agriculture.

Thinking – and growing – localBy Dave Yanko

Caitlin and Julie Olauson at The Local Kitchen in Saskatoon Photo by: Hogarth Photography

2 Saskatchewan NOW! } SPRING 2017

Putting the (electric) pedal tothe metalBy Virginia Wilkinson

Saskatchewan entrepreneur Roshan omaswasn’t looking to create an international exportbusiness four years ago when he first built amotor for his pedal bike.

But that motor inspired the development of acompany that is now selling electric pedal bikesaround the world. Located in Saskatoon,Saskatchewan, Biktrix sells five different electricbike designs as well as bike conversion kits.

“In the past two years, we’ve sold bikes into theU.S., Canada, Iceland, Dubai, Finland, SwedenSwitzerland, U.K., Scotland, New Zealand andIndia,” said omas.

An emerging star on the international stage,Biktrix had very modest beginnings.

omas was a 24-year-old computer engineer-ing graduate from the University ofSaskatchewan who needed a reliable andaffordable vehicle for travel to and from work.He wanted an electric motorcycle, but foundthem financially out of reach; as a result, hebegan looking into electric pedal bikes. Unableto find something in his price range, he builthimself a motor and attached it to his pedalbike.

It was the beginning. His motor was so effectivethat he was able to travel at speeds of 32 kilo-metres per hour, catching the attention ofSaskatoon pedestrians.

“ese are pedal assist bikes—you need topedal for the motor to work. People used tostop me and ask how I was going so fast. A fewpeople wanted to buy, so I took their bikes andconverted them to electric. at’s pretty muchhow Biktrix got started,” he said.

In 2014, he initiated a Kickstarter campaign toraise funds for the development of his first elec-

tric Fat Bike. e campaign was a major success… and Biktrix was born. omas sold morethan 50 bikes through the campaign, raising$100,000, which he invested into the company.

His goal was to create the ultimate electric bike:a high-quality vehicle that would allow thebiker to “ride anywhere” and at an affordableprice.

omas travelled to China to learn more aboutbuilding electric bikes. is experience helpedhim both with bike design and production. Inthe end, he sourced the frame construction outof Taiwan; however, all Biktrix designs aredeveloped and all bikes assembled by his three-person team in Saskatoon.

Initially Biktrix offered two different designs:the Juggernaut, a heavy duty, all-terrain “rideanywhere” vehicle; and the Stunner, a sleek elec-tric cruiser that travels more than 60 kilometreson a single charge.

In 2014, Biktrix sold just a handful of bikes; in2015, sales grew to more than 100; in 2016,over 300 were produced and sold, and sales in2017 are climbing. All sales are done online,cutting out reseller costs and enabling Biktrixto price products below their competitors.

“We get e-mails from customers every day whotell us they’ve ridden to places they’ve never rid-den before—and they’ve pushed themselves onthe bike, because they’re able to get out muchmore often,” he said.

omas notes that a company with smallerproduct runs has a great ability to be nimbleand iterate quickly, incorporating customerfeedback to create new editions of current mod-els. Biktrix is now on its sixth edition of theJuggernaut and third edition of the Stunner.

Unique to Biktrix is the bike’s motor, which isbuilt into the centre of the frame rather thanattached on the wheel. is provides more bal-ance to the bike and enables the company tooffer bikes in all-wheel drive models.

Customer response has been so positive thatmany are coming back for second or thirdmodels for family members or friends. “Wehave people riding our bikes from age 20 up to95!”

Over the past two years, Biktrix has expandedinto other model types, and in 2016 launcheda folding e-bike. “We’ve been selling it mostlyto people who have RVs, or to commuters.ey can fold it up and take it inside withthem. It’s a really nimble and versatile bike,”omas said.

omas says 2017 will be a “super” excitingyear for Biktrix. e company is launching aline of new models in May, including a conver-sion kit for wheelchairs.

It will also be opening a unique showroom inSaskatoon’s Farmer’s Market site to allowprospective purchasers to test out their line ofbikes. omas is in the process of securing sim-ilar space in markets around the world, toshowcase the bikes and enable people to expe-rience them before purchasing.

Despite the fact that the company has just threeyears of sales under its belt, omas believes thecompany is on the cusp of rapid and substantialgrowth.

eir goal? “To be THE electric bike companyof choice … and to help people of all ages andbackgrounds experience the joy of riding,” saidomas.

Saskatchewan NOW! } SPRING 2017 3

Roshan Thomas, founder of Biktrix, with the Juggernaut Photo by: Calvin Fehr Photography

4 Saskatchewan NOW! } SPRING 2017

“Uncompromisingly smooth”: By Dave Yanko

e recipe Radouga Distilleries uses to pro-duce its acclaimed Provincial Vodka is avaluable trade secret. But Radouga Na-tional Marketing Director Cliff Skene saysthe water from the interglacial aquifer be-neath Radouga’s production facility atBlaine Lake, Saskatchewan is one ingredi-ent he’s happy to talk up.

“e easiest way to describe it is that a regular aquifer is like a lake in the groundwhile an interglacial aquifer is a lake that’sactually preserved in the glacial ice in theground,” says Skene.

“It’s the unique mineral composition of thewater to which we attribute a lot of thequality of our vodka.”

ere’s no question that many people arediscovering that Provincial Vodka is a qual-ity product. Enthusiasts include two panelsof judges who awarded it a gold medal ate New York Wine and Spirits Competi-tion in August last year. e blind tastetests pitted Radouga’s product against someof the biggest vodka producers in theworld. “We were competing with very old,very established international brands with

Paul Riben, Owner and CEO of Radouga Distilleries Photo by: Kevin Hogarth Photography

a lot of history behind them,” says Skene.“In his tasting notes, one of the judgeswrote that Provincial Vodka is ‘uncompro-misingly smooth.’” e vodka won a silvermedal at the 2015 competition.

Radouga also produces Provincial SpicedVodka as well as Apple Pie and BlueberryPie liqueurs. Company products are avail-able at Saskatchewan Liquor and GamingAuthority (SLGA) locations as well as at in-

dependents, restaurants, bars and pubs.Participating liquor stores in Alberta nowcarry Radouga products, and the firm hasapplied to enter markets in British Colum-bia and Manitoba. Entering the U.S. mar-ket is one of Radouga’s big goals, andSkene says he expects to hear the result ofits U.S. application very soon.

Radouga owner and CEO Paul Ribenlaunched Radouga Distilleries in 2014 fol-lowing years of market research. In spite ofits short time in the marketplace, Radougaalready requires a much bigger building tokeep up with demand. When the com-pany’s new facility is completed later thisyear, Radouga will be producing its small-batch, boutique products in a 6,000-sq.-ft.building adjacent to its current propertyon Riben’s farmland, just outside of BlaineLake. e new structure is about five timesbigger than the one it will replace. Skene,who’s been with the company since 2015,says Radouga has eight full-time employeesincluding its Saskatchewan sales staff. ecompany has enlisted an agency to handleout-of-province sales.

When contacted for an interview, Skenehad just received notice that SLGA had ap-proved Radouga’s application to sellProvincial Vodka in 1.14 litre bottles, themetric-sized bottle that replaced the 40-ounce vessel. e move will come withbetter shelf placement at provinciallyowned liquor facilities and allow Radougato better compete with the big, name-brand vodkas that all come in the 1.14 litresize. “With the bigger bottles we’ll get abigger real estate footprint in the stores,”says Skene. “It’s better optics.” e larger bottles are a reflection of Provin-cial Vodka’s popularity and a more efficientway to sell product. But success brings newissues. Skene says craft distillers inSaskatchewan can now produce up to

200,000 litres of product per year—upfrom the recent limit of 50,000 litres—andstill retain their craft designation. One ofthe advantages of the designation is theright to sell product on-site; however,Radouga hasn’t included a tasting and salesfacility in its expansion plans and hasn’t de-cided whether it will add one in the future.e question may soon become irrelevantas company growth may make it ineligiblefor site sales.

“By our charting, we’re soon going to beproducing in excess of 200,000 litres,” saysSkene. If it came down to a choice betweenon-site sales and more volume and staturein SLGA stores, Skene says Radouga ishappy to take the latter and compete with“the big boys.”

Radouga is proud of its Saskatchewan rootsand never misses an opportunity to pro-mote its heritage. “People tasting the vodkawill often say ‘Wow, that’s incrediblysmooth. Where are you guys from, any-way?’ And we very, very proudly say ‘BlaineLake, Saskatchewan.’ And it never fails todraw smiles.”

Saskatchewan NOW! } SPRING 2017 5

Radouga Distilleries

6 Saskatchewan NOW! } SPRING 2017

Vendasta Technologies a tech startupWhen many people hear the words “tech-nology startup” these days, they likelyimagine a company working out of SiliconValley in California. It’s understandable,because some of these companies—such asFacebook and Uber—have emerged asworldwide leaders.

But thanks to companies like VendastaTechnologies based in Saskatoon, theprovince is taking steps toward beingknown as the “Saskatchewan Valley.” Sinceforming in 2008, Vendasta—which sellsdigital solutions to local businesses—hasgrown by at least 50 per cent per year andworks with 13 of the top 15 media com-panies in the U.S. and 1,700 total resellers,marketing to over 600,000 local busi-nesses.

“We’re proud to be here,” said BrendanKing, CEO of Vendasta.

“Being located in Saskatoon has a lot ofcompetitive advantages. We don’t have theexorbitant office space costs they have inthe valley, and that was especially helpfulin the early years. We have a great talentpool coming out of our universities, andwe tend to attract loyal people who wantto stick around.”

He added that being a tech company basedin Saskatchewan can be challenging, specif-ically when it comes to the ability to raisefunds and find specialized/appropriate tal-ent in the small, albeit expanding, techecosystem. In more traditional tech centreslike San Francisco or New York, companies

have greater access to capital and people.“at said, the people we have found in,and attracted back to, Saskatchewan areperhaps our biggest asset.”

Like most startups that eventually find suc-cess, it was certainly not a clear path forVendasta to reach this point. As Kingnotes, the company originally wanted tobuild a social platform for homeowners tofind and share inspiration for home proj-ects and also find trusted home serviceproviders that their friends had used. Acouple of employees developed a plan andsought to secure financing, while themajority of staff took on contract work tohelp pay the bills.

King had previously started two successfulcomputer retailing operations: Delron(1990-95) and CompuSmart (1995-2000). Most recently, he was working asthe Chief Operation Officer for Point2Technologies, a company he and other staffmembers left to form Vendasta.

“We were leaving a stable job to head intoa very uncertain environment where wehad to raise money and earn consultingcontracts in order to eat,” King said. “As formy personal situation, it was even more ofa leap of faith because I had just purchaseda new home and had a baby on the way …so you can imagine.”

As Vendasta built its platform, it discoveredthat homeowners were hesitant to shareinformation about their home online. Butas King notes, they discovered there was a

definite need for online reputation man-agement, which set the company on itscurrent course.

While a startup company might normallybegin by reaching out to smaller compa-nies, King said that approaching larger cus-tomers in the U.S. was actually a “logicalplace to start.” Vendasta’s first customerswere newspaper and yellow page compa-nies in 2010, which were experiencing rev-enue drops from their traditional printproducts. By “becoming industry and sub-ject matter experts,” King said Vendastawas able to market to these companies.

“We started with consulting, then becamea point solution provider, and we’re now afull platform,” King said. “ose changescame from a lot of heavy local marketinglearning—from the industry, from ourpartners and from ourselves. We adaptedand changed to solve the problems we'refacing and the ones we could see our part-ners were going to face. In all that change,however, I think we’ve preserved our start-up mentality and our company culture.”

Vendasta aspires to be the top platform forselling digital solutions to local businesses.As King explained it, his company providesa “business-in-a-box” to any company thatprovides advertising or marketing servicesto local businesses.

“We provide these companies with abrandable platform that includes a com-plete marketplace of products allowingthem to provide local business with every-

By Pat Rediger

Saskatchewan NOW! } SPRING 2017 7

flourishes as

thing they need,” King said. “Unlike othermarketplaces, our platform provides acomplete go-to market solution. We usebig data and automation to help our part-ners market, sell and fulfill these productsand ensure usage, and therefore retentionand upsells. In short, partners that use ourproducts are able to sell more things moreeasily, to more customers and make moremoney.”

As King is quick to add, the success ofVendasta can be attributed to the qualityof the staff they hire.

“While it is difficult to find someone per-fectly qualified for specific positions, weconsider ourselves very lucky to be inSaskatoon. People don’t always enter withthe exact right skillset, but they have theattitude, determination and work ethic tolearn,” he said.

“While one of my co-founders has beenbased out of Vancouver since the begin-ning, over the years some of our Saskatoonemployees had to move to these cities.ey were extremely valuable and we werehappy to keep them on as remote employ-ees. We’ve since hired more team membersin these cities and a few others—Augusta,Seattle and San Diego—as we find quali-fied, passionate people to build our team.”

Vendasta clearly knows how to create anattractive work environment as it has beenvoted one of the “10 Positive CityWorkplaces” in Saskatoon.

“Our philosophy is to try and take awayfrom the daily mundane tasks to allow peo-ple to work harder,” King said. “For thatreason, we’re always trying to eliminatethose tasks. Groceries, breakfasts, lunches,yoga, flexible work schedules all help to dothis. We also have great benefits, social

events and professional developmentopportunities, to name a few.”

e future of Vendasta looks bright as thecompany is expecting an increased revenuetrajectory this year. e company is cur-rently building an app store to help agen-cies and media companies diversify theirproduct offering and see all their analytics,reporting and billing in one place.Vendasta is also creating the LocalMarketing Index, which King said couldbe “revolutionary for our industry.

“We are setting the industry standard forhow a business is performing in context toother businesses in the same vertical andtelling them what they need to do to getbetter,” King said. “As we add more prod-ucts to our platform, our partners aretelling and showing us that we will be ableto help them be more successful.”

Photo by: Chris Hendrickson Photography Brendan King Chief Executive Officer for Vendesta

8 Saskatchewan NOW! } SPRING 2017

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In a research project during her final year in2011, she was part of a team that developed adifferent pulse-based snack bar that won theprovincial leg of a national contest and placedsecond in Canada. “It was my first exposureto product development. en I got a job inproduct development and that helped melearn from some of the mistakes I made thefirst time around.”

It was at the Saskatchewan Food IndustryDevelopment Centre in Saskatoon whereOlauson polished up her skills and knowledgeabout food production. e Food Centre is anon-profit organization that offers a full rangeof services to small and medium-sized busi-nesses looking to add value to agriculturalproducts. Today, she and her sister rent partof the facility for a day or so when they needto make and package a new batch of snackbars—they use crispy, ready-to-eat quinoagrown in Saskatchewan and processed by alocal company.

It was also at the Food Centre where shelearned about the Saskatchewan Agri-ValueInitiative (SAVI), a Saskatchewan Ministry ofAgriculture program that provides assistanceto small and medium-sized businesses wishingto add value to agricultural products. She andJulie applied for and received a grant reim-bursing them for 50 per cent of certainexpenditures. “Starting a food business can bepretty expensive—you have upfront costs andyou don’t know if you’re going to make thatmoney back again. SAVI was incredibly help-ful to us.”

Olauson, a new mom who recently earned amaster’s degree in community health, recentlylaunched e Local Kitchen, a firm with a“parallel ideology” to e Local Bar that sheoperates with two partners. “It’s a communityshared kitchen space where we do cookingclasses, workshops and kitchen rentals,” saysOlauson, adding the company received helpfrom the Women Entrepreneurs ofSaskatchewan in organizing the enterprise.

“We’re trying to create a community of differ-ent food businesses that learn from each other.It’s filled with people creating food products.”

Olauson says that making nutritious productsfrom whole foods grown in Saskatchewansuits her belief system and lifestyle. She thinksthat helping others to do the same creates asynergy that bodes well for Saskatchewan’seconomy.

“ere’s an odd thing that happens with localfood. As you connect with people, you growtogether. I think the more that local food busi-nesses can help each other out, the more ithelps the whole industry grow.”

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Thinking – and growing – local