Celebrating Canadian Cuisine on Food Day Canada

By Kathleen Beveridge Saturday is Food Day Canada, which means we get to celebrate by eating delicious Canadian cuisine.

And we share it @FoodDayCanada with #CanadaISFood #FDC2015

Canada is known across the globe for a variety of things: saying “sorry” and “eh”, maple syrup, and being cold (although that idea is out the window lately), but what is often forgotten is how delicious and diverse our local food is across the country. And let’s be honest, that’s silly, considering we eat every single day.

At Town Hall we couldn’t be more proud to have clients that are a part of this movement, from Langley’s Well Seasoned Gourmet Food Store’s owner and local food queen, Angie Quaale, who buys local whenever she can and uses it in her recipes; to the members of the Chefs’ Table Society who all stand behind sustainable and local foods, to our winery clients who produce wine sourced from BC grown grapes.

We also have some clients who source locally and sustainably for their restaurants, including Summerhill Pyramid Winery’s Sunset Organic Bistro, the new restaurant at Evolve Cellars, and the soon-to-open Perch Restaurant, located in the beautiful new AMS building at UBC. These restaurants support local farms and are Ocean Wise.

Top this list off with our client, the BC Hospitality Foundation, who supports those working in the Food and Beverage industry with financial support for industry workers when the need arises, keeping the Canadian food and beverage movement on its feet.

It’s more important than ever to buy local and support Canada’s economy, but more importantly the people, who put so much into growing and creating nutritious food to fuel us through each day.

Now I’ll go celebrate by picking local blackberries and raising my glass (full of BC wine) to Canadian cuisine.

How will you celebrate Food Day Canada? In Kelowna, celebrate at Summerhill Pyramid Winery's Sunset Organic Bistro, one of the 250 participating restaurants in Food Day Canada.

Try wine from one of these BC wineries this Food Day Canada:

Blue Grouse Estate Winery

Coolshanagh

Evolve Cellars

McWatters Collection

Monte Creek Ranch

Mt. Boucherie Winery

Okanagan Crush Pad

Serendipity Winery

Singletree Winery

SpierHead Winery

Summerhill Pyramid Winery

TIME Estate Winery

Meet Kayla Koroush With Town Hall

By Leeann Froese It's a new week to introduce you to one of the fabulous personalities in the world #withTownHall!

This does not mean they work as part of our team, or are our client (although sometimes they are).

We just interact with so many amazing people that we want to expand networks and introduce them to you, and you to them. This week #withTownHall, we introduce you to Kayla Koroush.

Once aiming to be a preschool teacher, Kayla works in the marketing department for a winery in Napa Valley, and she blogs for herself at Barrel Thief, a wine blog (a barrel thief is a glass tube that helps vacuum wine out of bottles so vintners can have a taste.) Her blog is a place where she can document her encounters while she explores the world of wine.

We met Kayla at the Wine Bloggers Conference in Buellton, in 2014, where she was a scholarship recipient to attend the conference, and we will see her at the annual Wine Bloggers Conference again in a couple of weeks when the conference takes place in Finger Lakes New York.

Watch our social media for a hello from Kayla when we meet her again in a few weeks, and in the meantime, please give her a hello, as we did when she recently visited Vancouver's Granville Island.

Leave a comment below – or go give this post a like or share on Facebook or Twitter.

Meet Christine Campbell with Town Hall

By Leeann Froese It's Saturday - that means it's time to introduce you to one of the fabulous personalities in the world #withTownHall

This does not mean they work as part of our team, or are our client (although sometimes they are).

We just interact with so many amazing people that we want to expand networks and introduce them to you, and you to them. This week #withTownHall, we introduce you to Christine Campbell.

Christine is an avid traveler and lover of ‘all things wine’.

Based in Vancouver, Canada, Christine sits on the BC VQA assessment panel.

She holds her Wine & Spirits Education Trust Advanced Level 3 certificate. Driven by her passion, she also completed her French Wine Scholar course and is continuing with the Master of Champagne course through the French Wine Society.

When not studying wine, Christine writes weekly on her wine blog Girls Go Grape and is a contributor for the Alcohol Professor and Wine Tourist Magazine.

Christine is a friendly and spirited person with a zest for life. She is the mom to a gorgeous daughter and also loves dogs.

Seen here cheekily enjoying a cocktail (because she does realize there is more to enjoy than just wine) Christine would love a hello from you.

Leave a comment below – or go give this post a like or share on Facebook or Twitter.

It's OK to have opinions - and 4 other things I have learned in business

By Leeann Froese

5 Things I have learned on our 2nd Anniversary

I am not sure how that happened so fast, but our little agency is two years old this month.

Andrew and I want to thank our amazing team and our clients for allowing us to us create brands and get the word out on things that celebrate living well: wine, food, hospitality, financial planning, film, and sport.

I have been learning new lessons everyday, and wanted to share a few things that rank at the top of my mind as we celebrate the start of year three #withTownHall.

I'd love to know, if you own a business, what are you learning? Maybe we can learn from each other? Listed as a countdown, but not in strict order:

5. It's OK to have opinions - even if they are unpopular

For much of my career I only cared about being a people pleaser. I still possess this trait, and our team also shares this trait, but not at the expense of giving bad advice or being untruthful.

My mentor, Christine Coletta, instilled in me the saying 'we're not here for a haircut', meaning that people don't look to my expertise so I can blow smoke, or not make things happen. As such, people can count on our team for good content and to get things done.

I have also realized since opening Town Hall that after almost 20 years in the industry I have knowledge to share and I should provide not only expertise, but also the truth and my own opinions, especially if they defend clients, and even if these opinions or truths are unpopular or are not what people had hoped to hear.

So now, I give my complete opinion when asked, or call out situations when I need to. An example of this is my recent post about those who ask for wine donations. Sorry, everyone who wants free wine.

4. The right team is everything

There is no way that Andrew and I could deliver strong programming to our clients without the contributions of a strong design and communication team. I'm so proud of the work that our team does to create identities and raise profiles.

It has taken the full two years, with some personalities coming and going (and this may continue as the business evolves) but when the fit is right, as it currently is, the culture and work output can be magic.

Thank you Sujinder, Felicia, Amy, Laurisha, Ali, Lindsey, Kathleen, Lindsey, our newest member, Carole, and our consultants Alana and Irene, for being so key in the team's success. We would be nowhere without you all!

3. A home office can only hold so much

We are seeking a new space, and ideally, by our 3rd birthday we will be in a different office. We are working with a realtor but the Vancouver market is hot. Wish us luck!

2. We need to tell people what else we do

Many people don't realize we are a full service agency and think that we only offer publicity services, or that I am singularly a PR person.

So can you please help it be known: we offer packaging, media relations, social media outreach, logo and graphic design, advertising campaigns, events and marketing strategy.

Also, we are not the popular Joseph Richards Group owned Townhall Public House.

We named our company “Town Hall” based on collaboration, which we feel is so important, especially in this era of crowd-sourced information and real-time customer feedback.

It is our constant goal to be a lifestyle destination, and deliver projects that inspire and celebrate the good life.

1. We are just getting started

In the scheme of a growing business we are really just getting started. The learning curve for sure is super steep.

I was looking after a lot of the agency work at Coletta and Associates before we closed the doors there, but there's nothing quite like being the one who's the air traffic controller and holding the bag and making sure that everybody's rent gets paid.

We are super thankful to our clients who believe in what we're doing at our little agency. We truly love you!

Life is too short to work with people you don't like and products you don't fall in love with.

We thank everybody for coming along for our ride #withTownHall

We are very social with what we do - so converse with us on your favourite social network @townhallbrands.

Keep up with what we do and talk to us on Facebook, Instagram or Twitter.

We look forward to what the next year brings!

This week #withTownHall meet a swearing Minion

By Leeann Froese It's Saturday - that means it's time to introduce you to one of the fabulous personalities in the world #withTownHall

This does not mean they work as part of our team, or are our client (although sometimes they are).We just interact with so many amazing people that we want to expand networks and introduce them to you, and you to them.

However, this week #withTownHall, for something a little different, we introduce you to a swearing Minion.

For the uninitiated, Minions are the lovable yellow stars of the Universal Studio films Despicable Me and Despicable Me 2 who feature the character Felonious Gru, a super villain. His evil deeds are undertaken by his team of Minions.

The Minions are small, yellow pill-like creatures that speak a made-up language called Minionese. They are super cute, and funny in their efforts to implement evil plans and household tasks for Gru.

Now, the Minions star in their own hotly-anticipated prequel film featuring Minions as the main characters, and focuses on the Minions before they met Gru. The film opens this weekend across North America, and there is a marketing and licensing frenzy to accompany the release.

Everywhere you look there is merch featuring the Minions, and at McDonald's there is a Minions Happy Meal, where a free Minions toy is available with purchase of any Happy Meal while supplies last.

This all seems straightforward, as McDonald's does similar meals and toy giveaways with other motion picture partnerships, but this giveaway created a media hailstorm.

Several parents are outraged, complained that the Minionese that the little characters speak sounds like swear words, including "what the f&$k" and "well I'll be damned".

This report on CBC news explains the whole situation, and states that our brains try to make sense of sounds and that is why some of us might think we are hearing nonsense as curse words.

This parent video (you need to turn up the sound) demonstrates what some people are saying they hear. Is this cute little cave Minion saying "what the f___" ?

What do you think - is this Minion swearing?

McDonald's says there are no plans to take the toys out of distribution.

Weigh in with your opinion here with a comment below – or go give this post a like or share on Facebook or Twitter.

Meet Chris Pritchett With Town Hall

By Leeann Froese It's Saturday - that means it's time to introduce you to one of the fabulous personalities in the world #withTownHall

This does not mean they work as part of our team, or are our client (although sometimes they are).

We just interact with so many amazing people that we want to expand networks and introduce them to you, and you to them. This week #withTownHall, we introduce you to Chris Pritchett.

As someone who was born in America we thought it would be fitting to introduce you to Chris on the Fourth of July.

Also we chose to introduce you to him this week because just this week he has just been named the new head coach for the UBC Thunderbirds Baseball team.

Most recently Chris was a scout for the Boston Red Sox, and in years before that his career has been built through the major-league baseball system, and that includes ties to our own Vancouver Canadians.

Before he became a scout for the Red Sox he was a hitting coach for the Vancouver Canadians, and his connection to Vancouver and the C's goes back even further than that.

In 1991 Chris was drafted to the California Angels and four years later he played as first baseman for what was then a AAA Vancouver Canadians team. After more than 450 games with the C's, he played in the California Angels organization until 2003 when he retired and returned to university.

After topping up his education with a couple of degrees, for the past four years he has traveled across Canada to help the Red Sox discover tomorrow's next players. Now, he returns to Vancouver where he lives with his wife Saffron Henderson and their two sons, and they are very glad to have him in Vancouver to return home every night.

Chris takes over as head coach of the Thunderbirds from Terry McKaig, who after 18 seasons, moves into the role of UBC's director of baseball. Congratulations to Terry!

Now please help us congratulate UBC on their change, and Chris on coming back home to Vancouver by saying hello here.

Leave a comment below – or go give this post a like or share on Facebook or Twitter.