CANADIAN DREAM PODCAST: The Irish carpenter building a business empire in Canada

have uh big goals and ambitions if people are not laughing at your goals they're not goals at all we didn't have much we had a good attitude we worked really really hard and we surrounded ourselves with good people that was the The Key to Our Success [Applause] [Music] welcome to another episode of the Canadian dream podcast I'm here today with someone that I just had the pleasure to meet in person but he is a very successful entrepreneur based in Vancouver Canada and he came from Ireland a few years ago and built an empire in two different Industries so I want to introduce you to William hey Elton thank you very much for having me on your podcast first time when we talked over the phone I I told you it feels like I'm talking to McGregor and you'd actually look very fit how old are you now I'm 40 now 40. yeah but you exercise and and you run a few businesses I do I try and get to the gym as much as possible I used to go on a daily basis but now I've got a few companies and three young kids and a wife to take care of so I try and uh not go to the gym every morning and spend a bit more time at home with them and help get the kids out before we get always our day uh so I typically would go to the gym on Monday Wednesday and Friday nice I want to know a lot about the businesses that you have but before we get into that topic how did you end up here in Canada oh that's a good question and a long story but I'll give you the the shortened version so in about uh 2007 2008 the the industry was the economy was getting pretty uh shot in Europe um there wasn't construction was slowing down uh the writing was on the wall there was a serious recession on the way so in the start of 2009 Laura my wife uh girlfriend at the time said why don't we go and do a bit of traveling and I had no intention of ever traveling I'm from uh Galway the west coast of Ireland a small little village with three thousand people and my mom has had 10 kids in my mom and dad so a big family very very close they're all living at home or close to home so no interest in in leaving the country or moving away but I thought you know what this might be an opportunity um I had a lease on a pub in our area from the age of 20 to 25 and also had a carpentry Construction Company so thought this might be a bit of a break you know and uh in 2008 in the summer in Ireland it was very wet so we said we don't want to go through another one of those and let's go away for I don't know a month or three months or six months and and see a bit of the world and then we could come back and and settle down but um the plan was initially to go to Australia because at that time there was a lot of Irish leaving and I'll say from the age of 20 to 30 leaving to go to Australia um it was booming over there the money was good um the Irish that I went in recent times were sending over some nice pictures of them on the beach and enjoying themselves and having fun and it just looked like the dream so uh a lot of Irish went to Australia and I thought that that's where we were going to go to and I said to Laura I said what part of Australia will we go to like Parker Sydney or Melbourne she was like we're not going to Australia all your friends are going there uh she was right that was a very good call and um uh I've been working I'm a carpenter by trade so working in the construction industry you know you finish work on a Friday evening and the sun is shining you're in Melbourne or Sydney and uh the guys say let's go for a beer that's what would happen so she said that's what'll be happening and I'll be looking for you guys so um I started laughing and I said you're so right so I said where are we going she said how about Canada and we did know a lot of people in Toronto in particular Laura's family uh her dad Mike had very good friends in Toronto so we could have went there and we'd have a good foundation or you know somebody to help us out and get get set up there it would have been uh relatively easier than coming to Vancouver anyway uh but I do a lot of equestrian stuff and I was I was a horseback riding with a gentleman called Dr Ken care Adam his wife had trained in Vancouver as surgeons and spent a number of years here and they also had I think it was eight young kids at the time in Ireland when I was talking to him and I was like how do you do it of course uh he said look as we had I think we I think there's been seven or eight years in Vancouver actually a lot of uh doctors from Vancouver trained in Dublin and a lot from Dublin in Ireland trained in in Vancouver so I I wasn't aware of that at the time um but he was doing surgery as well on one of my shoulders I had hurt my shoulder playing a game called heartling it's like one of Ireland's national sport so he he was doing some surgery on my shoulder and we were doing some equestrian stuff and he convinced me to to go to Vancouver he said just go to Vancouver on your way to Toronto like go for a week you know or a month uh but she said if you go to Toronto you never go to Vancouver because they're so far apart Canada is huge uh Toronto might be almost as fair from Vancouver as Ireland would be from Toronto so um I said I will and he said I'm not gonna let you I'm not going to leave this alone until you book your flight to Vancouver and I see them so he was adamant and we did book the flights because uh also the the Winter Olympics were all in Vancouver in 2010 and we said this it'd be cool you know if we did end up staying in in Vancouver we could kind of see a bit of a build up to the Olympics and and see what things are like and we might never get that opportunity again so we booked into the Romero Hotel on Granville Street uh very fancy um for I think it was maybe 10 days or two weeks and we just fell in love with the place after the first week we thought this was Paradise uh the weather was fantastic I think it didn't rain we ended up staying in Vancouver obviously but I think it didn't rain for 100 days after we got there in that summer uh 2009 in Vancouver it was spectacular um no Irish here at the time really we had no contacts no phone number didn't know anybody flew into YVR got a taxi drove up Granville Granville was all torn up for the Olympics they had the streets Dugout we were like where have we just arrived like is what's going on here is this the main street in Vancouver and we were a little shocked to say the least ran into some really nice people uh like early on and we decided you know let's stay for another week and another week and a couple of weeks became a month and then it was six months and then it was uh 10 months and at 10 months you had to be because it was a one-year Visa we were allowed to come on a one-year working holiday Visa so it takes like to extend that or you know to allow yourself to stay on yeah you need a few months of a grace period there too to apply for your paperwork and all the rest so after about 10 months you'd need to be taking care of that or else your Visa is up and you gotta leave the country and go home and you don't get a second bite of the Cherry so thankfully I had got a job in construction I was doing pretty well I'm a carpenter by trade as I said and my boss said after 10 months I asked him would he sponsor me and he said he would so he sponsored me uh to stay in the country and the rest is history who was the boss and what were you doing at the time I was uh running some concrete crew so we were doing like farm work and Framing and I was working for a company called Contact construction so it was like concrete Tech and um are they still around though they are still around yeah Hal Andrews is the owner a lovely lovely man and um I worked with contact for a while then I walked with Jacob Brothers for a while the first job I had was wish contact with the company that sponsored me but the first job I had was with Jacob brothers who were a pretty big company here in Canada uh could be in the top 10. construction companies um Scott Todd and Jason Three Brothers uh they have a fantastic company great people working for them but I started working with them about maybe three weeks into my Canadian Journey um it was very tough to get a job um at the start but we were kind of doing things why was it hard weren't they building for the Olympics yeah so I would assume there's a there was a lot of construction going on yes Elton Bush we were we were kind of doing things like we would back in Europe or in Ireland we were sending out resumes all the time or when we're like when we were sending out 20 30 resumes a day and no one's getting back to us but now as a business owner myself I realized when people are that busy you know they don't get back to everybody and it's way more um beneficial and effective to get in front of people so I was actually sitting at a bear on Granville Street having a beer um maybe a week or two in after coming from Ireland uh that was 2009 and a gentleman said to me he said you know what you need to do he said I'm talking to you you're a good guy you had your own company your Carpenter you know what you're doing like there's no reason you shouldn't have work but you need to get a hard hat you need to get a vest pair of steel toe boots and get up early in the morning and walk into a few construction sites and I thought that's a great idea so I did do that I left the bear I went to a place called Max Workwear and I got a pair of boots and I got a vest and I got a hair test and uh I put on my my sneakers pants we called them back in Europe like your Carpenter's pants and uh it was 6 a.m and I walked into 1067 Granville Street and that was the head office at the time for uh Jacob Brothers uh for the project they were doing it was kind of the revamp of Granville Street for the Olympics the main street right and I walked in and I met a gentleman called Trevor Trombley and I sat down and had a conversation with him for 15 minutes and he hired me on the spot sixteen dollars an hour off uh and uh and why did he say he hired you he asked me some questions about construction and you know uh wanted to hear my background and what we're doing and I one thing he really liked about it was we come from the country and with a family background and he said I've had great success hiring people in the construction industry uh that come from firms you know farming backgrounds and artworkers yes and he said the Irish have a good reputation for construction and for working hours and he said you're coming from a family background you you must be good so I said give me a chance you know and genuinely I was desperate we didn't come with a lot of money uh we had bought a car uh so we bought a vehicle like the first week we got here I was buying a few tools just to be kind of set myself up we got an apartment and we had to furnish that so whatever money we brought with us was gone and you know it wasn't an option to call home and say can you send me some more money you know that wasn't an option so we had to make this work and um our local community has had a big gone away party for us as well so it would have been a bit embarrassing if we came home after three or four weeks and said hey we're back again that wouldn't have went down well you know so what were your priorities back then or did you just want to get a job so you could to apply for a Visa extension or did you want to just pay the bills or were you also interested in building your career in Canada at that moment in time I just wanted to get a job to pay the bills because there was money going out of the account every day and nothing coming in and was your wife working as well no she wasn't working yet she was sending out resumes and looking for work for what type of work Laura has a background in HR and business so um she ended up getting a job with uh Bell Mobility and so uh that was probably maybe a month after myself or something like that but it was a bit tougher for her to get uh work so that's how the Canadian dream started once you both had jobs then it's where you could finally relax and start enjoying the journey exactly yes uh it was a huge breath of fresh air for the both of us to have a work a full-time job you know 40 hours a week um actually we were working at least 70 hours a week on Grandville Street with Jacob Brothers like weed on an insane amount of overtime and because it was very very tight uh deadlines and the construction schedule was was strict because we were going to be on the big stage for the Olympics and we couldn't afford to not be prepared and this was the first time you had the job not only outside of Ireland but outside of where you came from in Ireland right so you were working with people from very different backgrounds how was that experience for you yes yeah that's a good question and uh that was an incredible experience we we ended up leaving the Ramada and getting accommodation on Fifth and Balsam and kitsalano and we called it the international house there was 19 bedrooms and I think from about 12 different countries and we're still very very good friends with most of those people uh whether it be Switzerland or Australia or Argentina or Ireland or Canada um we became New Zealand we became really good friends with those people and it was it was a great experience we would have Barbecues in the evening after work we'll go to the beach girls and drink some beers um it was fantastic that all sounds great but tell me it's something very challenging that it faced during those first say three or or four months the first challenge was trying to give work you know and there was a a good lesson you know get in front of people and networking so it just shows you how important networking is you know uh referrals Word of Mouth um but when you talk to somebody you can tell any good business person or company owner uh you know if they're talking to someone for 10 or 15 minutes in an interview they'll know if this person is the right fit or not so try and get in front of people you can't do that uh on a resume you know or by writing something on a piece of paper it just doesn't work so that was a big challenge but I think the major challenge was leaving our family you know all of our family are in Ireland we're in we're half half the way across the world um trying to find work trying to set up a new apartment trying to make friends um but I must say the Canadians and in particular the Vancouver rights were so friendly they were so welcoming and so warm and would bend over back ways to help you no matter what it was um and that really made things a little bit easier for us and before we knew us in you know six months or a year we had friends here as good as the friends we left at home and this was kind of this was like our Canadian family um and that's really really helped us settle here um I never thought uh that we would stay in Canada it was never a plan um we hadn't immigrated permanently we just we went on a working holiday but uh I think we met met such good friends and BC is such a beautiful place um it was meant to be it was meant to be and to when did you go back to Ireland for the first time at the end of the year in 2009 for a wedding so um uh December and um we've seen everybody and told that we're having a great time uh stayed for about 10 days or two weeks and then came back to actually we said a bit longer than that we said for three weeks the first time and then went back to uh Vancouver and a very good story actually about that because I was working for Jacob Brothers at the time and when I got back to Vancouver got into our apartment uh we had since moved into an apartment in the West End and our mail was on the floor we started opening our mail and I seen this T4 and I thought that a T4 was like what we would call it Ireland a p-45 I thought I'd been laid off and I opened it and Laura was at work and I like text her I said I've been laid off you know and she's out like things were going so well with Jacob brothers and um they would always encourage you to take some extra time off at Christmas and um you could be out for three weeks or a month no problem the construction is a little bit quieter so it was a good they would encourage you to take your vacation at that time of the year so they weren't on to me looking for me to come back and then I got this letter in the mail and I had never got a T4 before and it doesn't work like that in Ireland so I went on Craigslist I think it was but looking for more jobs I got a job with contact who ended up sponsoring me and uh uh started with him and I was probably like a week or 10 days in with contact and then Jacob Brothers called me up Trevor Trombley called me again and he said William when are you coming back from work like you ever going to come back from Ireland what's going on and uh starts laughing and I said Trevor I've been laid off by the office uh I am working for another company now in UBC and he starts laughing he's like no way you couldn't be laid off like running a crew with us would give you a vehicle I had actually been up to their the owner's cabins in in Golden and stayed with them so we were getting out really really well and uh he said what like what kind of announce did you get and I I said like it was a T4 and he's like you idiot that's the hot that's for your tax returns that's for filing your taxes that's not a layer of notice so we had a good laugh over that and I said honestly Trevor I can't leave uh contact now you know um it's busy over there it's a small crew and they they need some help um so if it doesn't work out I'll get back to you he's like you know don't wait long and uh and that was it uh but server contact got sponsored and then we got sponsored yeah ended up opening IRL construction then in 2011. it's when you never mentioned the salary uh was it always okay or were you not really concerned about the salary and when I started with Jacob Brothers initially it was about 16 an hour if you had a carpenter come here now and you offer them 16 an hour they'd laugh at you and you know it's only watched 13 14 years later but um you wouldn't get them for 26 you know maybe 36 they'd be asking for but uh I was happy to get it and uh In fairness that was like that wasn't a low ball rate or anything at the time but uh I must say if Trevor and Jacob Brothers uh every week they would give me a little increase like on a weekly basis Trevor would say give me an extra dollar this week you know and I was very very grateful for that um that was you know an extra 70 dollars a week or maybe eighty dollars a week um and I'm going to apply that by 52 it was a nice little uh increase uh per annum and uh that went on for a while until I was making a a good race I was very happy with Jacob brothers and you know what if I hadn't have made that error with the T4 I'd probably be still working with them for today so like I really believe that everything happens for a reason everything good and bad um but uh it's funny how that's panned out and then a couple years later that is a great story yeah no I wanted to uh I wanted to know oh sorry that's a great story now I want to know what made you start your own construction company I was working with a company in in Vancouver and um wouldn't we be trying to meet taste deadlines um in particular you know concrete pours so we're doing farm work and we're doing big slabs and decks and we would have a pour on a Friday and would be a bit behind our schedule and we would need some extra help so my boss would typically say you know call this number um there's probably three or four labor hire companies call that number get them uh to send you whatever you need so what do you need I need two carpenters and two helpers so I would do that then I'd call up at the local labor suppliers at least twice a month but one thing I noticed was there was always nobody ever came fully prepared they would have a hair task but no vest or they would have a hard hat in a vest but no pouch no tools or else they would have no steel toe boots so I always I was always scrambling to see if I could get bits and pieces in our tool container to get them ready for work and and set them up but I thought this was this was crazy you know you're coming to do a job and you're not prepared um and there was a lot of excuses sometimes you would try and get four and two would show up you know and we would always over order for that reason if we needed four we'd try and get five and four would show so and then there was excuses I missed the train I missed the bus so I said imagine if uh I set up a skill labor hire company and they were prepared and professional and they had tools that I would supply for them if they couldn't get them themselves we would give them their own vests so we would give them hard hats uh steel toe boots whatever to make sure that when they came to the job site they were ready to work and they would show up they would show up on time and and that's what we don't we set up Ira Construction in 2011 and uh that was part of our a big part of our business plan 2011 so that was only two years later that's right yeah how how was the beginning how did you and did your wife help you from the very indeed she still continued to work for Bell because that was kind of of D okay so I guess the save option so were you working behind the scenes in the evening on weekends on uh on a plan or did it just quit and decide to start yes uh I was I was doing a lot of side jobs in the evenings and at the weekends so uh I I would be working with contact UM during the day you know for let's say 40 45 hours a week and then I would do some side jobs um at the weekend and in the evenings building decks for pubs and clubs and restaurants downtown and it got so busy uh with all of the sidewalk I kind of said you know what I'm gonna take the leap and I'm gonna uh set up um my own little crew and start small and I did um Laura was a huge help my wife and she took care of the paperwork and the invoicing and I would just send her timesheets I started on my own initially then I went from one to three to five to Fifteen to fifty in probably the space of uh two years maybe and then by three years we had 150 full-time employees well how many do you have now we have about 200 now but that's with the hospitality and the construction so our construction doesn't have as many full-time employees we have scaled it back a bit just because we're very adamant on quality and you know I think with 150 uh full-time with the construction we kind of lost a bit of control and um there'd be certain jobs and stuff that might suffer a little bit because they're not getting enough attention and uh we decided to scale it back a little bit and just you know keep 50 people with the construction all the time uh full time and then we could bring in help where needed and further construction business were you profitable from day one or did you get any investors into the bills that we we had no investors um no Partners um and we didn't have to take out any loans either so we just grew it organically and so it was profitable from day one because uh we were working on what we'd call a time and material base cases so we were building the client per hour for our time and material and we were doing really good work and we had a very disciplined crew um I'll give you an example um when we don't a big project like the Seaforth Armory on Braden first we probably finished that up in 2016 I'll guess uh but I was there inside myself for two and a half years maybe I think we were there for three years all together and I was like the side four man running a crew of anywhere from 25 to 35 people and if people were scheduled to start at seven a.m they were in at 6 45 AM and they would put on their PPE in their boots and be working as I as I would say banging Nails uh you know being productive that's seven exactly and I would say to them look at you know it's very fair here in Canada because a lot of our workers now at this point might be Irish or uh traveling through like from Australia or the UK or easily we have people from Poland um everywhere it didn't matter where you came from once you had the right attitude that's all that mattered and uh with lots of local Canadians as well and you're getting paid from 7am so be working from 7am so the clients love that we weren't coming in at five to seven than our five past seven with a coffee in our hands I'm walking around and chatting and having a laugh and then like it was 7 15 or 7 30 by the time we were making any money for our clients so that that doesn't work so simple things like that went a long way and uh if people came in at five to seven with the coffee in their hand like that I would send them home you know and I wouldn't be mean about it I just say sorry John sorry Mary you know uh have you got a good excuse number one no I missed the boss I missed the train well you know these people were on the same bus on the same train as you are and they're here in time so you'd only ever have to do that once it was effective you'd send them home they wouldn't be upset with you because they under they knew the rules and then the next time they wouldn't be late they'd be there at 6 30 6 40 6 45 but they'd be on time and you know that's really helped us Bond as a team because we would be in the lunchroom in the morning having our coffee putting on our PPE and people will come in at 6 30 you know and we would have a bit of fun and crack some jokes and have our coffee together before we start work and people enjoyed that yeah William today's Sunday and we were supposed to start at 9 00 am so uh I have someone here behind the scenes here from Ireland he was supposed to meet me here at 8 30. I I believe he texted me at 8 15. hey I'm here the gate is locked I said man I am still at home I'll buzz you in wait inside the building he was here 15 minutes earlier on a Sunday morning 8 15 in the morning yeah today that's the Irish yeah yeah that Iris attic yes but like that goes a long way you know uh I always say the small things are the big things because the small things turn into big things and uh if you get into it give me some more examples not only for the construction but in any any relationships what small things have you been practicing in your life that you believe that have helped you become successful in your in your businesses yeah yeah so like I have a list of daily good habits I call it oh I have a list and what do I have uh like get up early in the morning uh drink lots of water exercise gratitude so stuff like that uh uh hygiene you know when I get up I brush my teeth I make my bed um just small little things like that and I find they help a lot and funny uh story but we have uh like when you're on on a construction site every week you have like a toolbox talk so the team get into a hotel for like 15 minutes and they just have a chat you know safety uh it's rather than we need any concerns and people get to uh have a quick little meeting and I decided a few months ago and we should do that for our office you know that'd be a good idea and everyone said yeah that'd be great we don't do underneath that because we got three offices in in South Falls Creek in Vancouver and they're different areas in different buildings so so let's do this so I said we don't need to do it every week because we've never done it before so let's start doing it bi-weekly so we meet like we met last Thursday and we have our little chat and we have a quick update from Egypt department and what's cool and what's new and what's happening and any concerns that happen that we should do right then we should stop doing and um one thing I said to them at the end of that meeting I said I have a small bit of homework for next for our next meeting in two weeks time so I want everybody to bring their daily good habits list I wanted I said it can be five things it could be ten things I said nobody knows you better than yourself so whatever works for you but uh it'll be interesting to see what they bring in in two weeks yeah so they'll just bring their little little piece of paper with their daily good habits on it and I I do like to try and um impress them small little things on our teams because they definitely work you know uh when I get into the office in the morning I make it my business to try and be upbeat and happy and say good morning to everybody and you know how was your weekend if it's Monday morning or how are you doing you know um it goes a long way it's it and my mom always said it costs nothing to be nice and uh actually I was out at the 91st Highland Games in Coquitlam yesterday and there was a gentleman and he was sitting by the bear and he was kind of watching what was going on it was very busy we have a mobile Pub out there and uh he I was just pulling some pints of stout Scottish Stout for the festival and uh he was watching you know and he was watching what was going on and uh he said at the end maybe a couple hours later he said I want to say something to you he said I'm a VPD and he showed me his bench and I won't mention his name because I got some friends in the BPD as well and uh I just said he said I I love your presence and he said you're obviously the boss you obviously owned this this rig this mobile pulp I said I do and he said I want to say something he said the way that you've been treating your staff all day with respect and he said the way you treat the customers every time I bought a beer off you you said thank you very much enjoy you know and he said you don't get that kind of customer service or you know P that gratitude or he said people normally nowadays they shove something out in front of you and they turn around they serve the next customer you know but I said the same thing to him I said my mom always had a castle on them to be nice and he he said uh he said that's why people uh good leaders will be successful because they give respect and they get respect and it's it it's as simple as that so the small things are the big things excellent story yeah tell me um do Irish people have a good reputation here in Canada they do they have a great reputation and um like I often get people uh superintendents project managers calling me up here during the week for the construction site and they would say William I need two Carpenters can you send me two irish guys like that happens on a regular basis and again it's because uh because we're an Irish owned and operated company I suppose um and uh that's just by default really like you know people know know what's from back home now um and a lot of people we hire directly from Ireland through Word of Mouth you know they're friends of friends or friends of family and uh probably 70 of our team are are Irish now so it's much easier for them to come now and get a Visa it is much faster that's right it's nowadays and you can get a two-year Visa right off the bat wow you don't have to get a wound here so that really helps it makes it so much easier so um uh they would the likelihood of them getting an Irish Carpenter is is pretty high you know so I'm not saying that the Irish are better than anybody else but they do have a very good reputation and people do ring me up and say I had those irish guys can you send them back to me um and it's again it's just the small things I always say don't argue with the client if the client wants you to hang the door that way you hang the door that way there's 15 different ways to hang the door but they're paying the bill it's their door they're the one that has to look at it for the rest of their life so you know don't say oh no we should do it this way you do whatever way they want you to do it you know and if they want you to change it afterwards you change it afterwards but um they have you in here to help them and we're providing a service for them so we we do whatever they ask us to do and you know we nod and we smile and we we're always polite and uh again just doing the small simple things right and people really really like that and and they would constantly say to me when I'm on site I will try and get out of sight every week typically on a Friday to to do site visits and the project managers are the owners the clients client reps superintendents they would say the same thing they would say uh you know your teams are very polite somebody said it to me yesterday not a week goes by that I don't hear it says your teams are very polite and very manually and they work hard and they're honest and it's it's our culture as well we've worked very hard to build that culture IRL when people ask me what does IRL stand for I say Integrity reliability and loyalty those are just some of our loyalty to you right yes that one was for the employees is that something that your wife came up with Ira l no no no no F she says it stands for it's really loris that's good I guess that's so you are the kind of uh guy who will work hard but then some somewhere along the the so you you are a kind of guy who likes to work hard but it seems like you also like to party is that why you have now five pubs uh yes I am I'm a real uh extrovert I I love people and that's probably coming from such a big family um but I do I love entertaining you know somebody said to me I said what are you doing out here in this mobile pulp like what do you do like does that drive you crazy I'm like no I enjoy this this is like this is nice I get out of the office I can leave my phone down I can pull some beers I can talk to people um it's fun the sun is shining I'm happy to I'm healthy and I'm and I'm happy and can't ask for much more but I I really uh I really do love what I do you know and it doesn't seem like work whatever you do to me no yeah I like the hospitality I like the construction um if my my siblings all of them went to University except myself I was the only one who didn't go to university uh and get third level education and I went and done an apprenticeship in carpentry and honestly Elton if I was doing it all over again I would do the same thing I traveled to I play a lot of sports and in 2001 2003 we got like little scholarships to play in uh in Chicago for example in the US playing hurling like that Irish sport and um never took me any more than 24 hours to get a job when I was doing that you know and here when I just got in front of the people like I was hired straight away so there's always a great demand in the construction industry in particular for Carpenters when we came here actually uh when we applied for our visa to come to Canada it was a pine system so um like 100 being you know the Most Wanted uh one being like we don't need this service at all and Laura my wife who is a lot smarter than I am and has her HR and business uh background and her degree um she couldn't qualify to come to Canada because there was no demand for that position they could fill those positions but Carpenters were the top of the list like at 99 points or something like that so because I was coming and she was my partner my common law uh she she could come as well and the two of us came under One Visa so you know construction um I think the opportunities are endless and I and I really encourage people to get into apprenticeships and if we've got three little boys now and uh if they ever said that they wanted to become Carpenters I'd be very proud and I would really encourage that because I've seen the best side superintendents the best developers the best Builders uh the most successful people I have have met a lot of them anyway um have a background in our construction are in carpentry yeah so and when did you open your first Pub in Vancouver we took over our first lease on Granville Street in 2016 and that was donland's Irish Pub um we had a purpose as you know in Ireland from the age of 20 to 25 just before we came to Canada and uh we promised ourselves we would never put ourselves through that pain again uh but after being here for a few years we said you know what there's an opportunity here Laura said William you're crazy don't even think about it I went uh behind her back and looked at a space with a realtor and I said this space has got lots of potential actually I went and looked at another space didn't like it and the reader said I have keys of a new space it used to be the Stone Temple on Grandma street now it's Joseph Richards do you want to check this out I'm not supposed to show it yet and I said well if is it far away so it's around the corner so went checked out the space I said this place needs a lot of work but it's a good location and the Granville Entertainment District it's a good size you know like four and a half thousand square feet and uh 200 seats and uh I said it like this could be a really good Irish pair so there was plenty of Irish bars in Vancouver but uh they weren't um operated by I guess uh people who had experience or who had also operated Irish bears in in our Ireland and our family and my mom's side were in the hospitality my uncle uh had pubs in Dublin City my grandfather so I'm steeped on that side on my dad's side they were into construction my mom said we're also into construction too but um the hospitality definitely came from my mom's side uh they go hand in hand together right Construction in pubs they do they do and I'm joking no they're they actually complement each other a lot because uh lots of problem owners have said to me here in Vancouver I wish I was you because you can take over a space today and starting there tomorrow start building it out and working 24 7 and get it built and save on the construction costs and time is money the problem is when you can't do that and I've seen this happen Elton so many times on Granville Street it's very sad when we were building Donlands I'd say I've seen five or seven different businesses go on bankrupt they they were building out their places and they never got to build them out because it took too long and they ran out of money and they never got to open their doors so we and look as we spent 18 months building out dunlands when we took that space over in 2016. didn't open until 2017 and we're paying probably like 25 000 a month on rent so that was a lot of money on top of our construction costs is that why you see so many buildings changing their name shutting down and reopening I think it's a big part of the reason I really do what are the other reasons just out of curiosity I know we're getting off the topic here just uh uh labor is a big challenge at the moment so is inflation so is high interest rates and a lot of it caused by the War I really do think that you know the war turned the world upside down and the Ukrainian yes Russian war yes how come okay I mean we're so far away we're not even in in I know but look at look at the supply chain how it affected our supply chain look at the price of you go to your Supermarket today buy some bread buy some milk like the Ukraine was the breadbasket of the world uh so it has really affected the whole world I can even see it in Ireland when I went home to Ireland about a month ago uh normally I go back to Ireland and I say wow things are cheap here and braids cheese mayonnaise eggs those things are so cheap compared to here uh but for the first time in my life I went back there a month ago and I said things are expensive here I was shocked first time in my life and I would try and typically go back every year but uh so it has affected everybody and uh High interest rates then trying to uh you know cure the inflation I suppose uh or at least contain it um because things are just a little out of control at the moment and I do think we're going to be dealing with this for another year I think uh 2024 uh by the end of 2024 things might set a little bit but I can't see it getting any better this year okay let's go back to the pubs so you started with the first one on rental is it where Joseph Richards were but yes oh yeah I went there a few times 10802 Grandville streets yeah and it used to be the Stone Temple before that which is very famous um and a lot of the Canadians would have put a phone out there but I remember that too Stone Temple yeah yeah that was a pretty pretty fun place but uh yeah so we spent 18 months renovating it we opened it uh Laura said to me as one point in the middle of the the renovation she goes like we put all of our money into this like everything what happens if it doesn't work well like I didn't know what to say because I was put on the spot and and I'm nervous myself but I have to keep the brave face and you know I always I always believed that when the chips are down and when uh your ass I guess your most nervous times you need to show a brave face you know if you're a good leader you can't right you can't Panic you can't stress out so I just said to her well worst case scenario Nora we lose everything uh we go back to live with our family in Ireland the people that love us she kind of looked and she said that's a good scenario yeah yeah all right but thankfully um we kicked on we got it opened and it just exploded it was a huge success and why do you think Looking Back Now what do you do right um look at a lot of Irish uh immigrated I came to Vancouver uh about lawyers loyalty right loyalty yeah they started to come and they wanted to go to um I think a true Irish bear you know uh um and we we knew how to give them that uh we are huge supporters of uh local uh organizations clubs Charities non-for-profits and we do lots and lots of stuff and they're very evolved in the community as well yes not just a business owner a pub where because I mean and and leave but you're that's right actually and that's what I that's one of the most things I enjoy about business is that it allows us to give back to the community and I mean that uh we have lots of festivals going on this year uh for example in a couple of weeks we'll have Irish day in the Square um please come down uh it's outside our office in Legend boot Square on the sea wall between Olympic Village and Granville Island that stamps landing area there South Falls Creek and it's Irish day in the square and it'll start at 12 o'clock and it'll run to 5 PM and we'll have little mobile pulp there will be given some beer and wine and saucers and some snacks and there'll be Irish dancing there'll be lots of live music and it's we've done it last year for the first time and people went crazy first and uh our local our local cafe there um a friend of ours uh Beth she runs a cafe called convivial and she says William not a day goes by the people don't come in and they say when is that Irish day on again is that going to be on again soon and she's like uh Anthony William we're gonna do that again I said okay we're gonna do it once a year that's my commitment so here it is it's coming up in a couple of weeks actually July 8th sorry uh yes July 8th it's going to be on and uh it'll be lots of fun so if you're about come down 12 to 5 um Irish day in the square in Legend boot Square yeah we're gonna release this after that and so it's too bad and tell me about the other pubs um the other so there's three or four more um we have four more so the then we went on to Shamrock down in English Bay uh Davey and Denman Shamrock is a great little place uh about 50 seats great location and close to the water there and honestly it's hard to get a seat in the Shamrock we often go down there Laura the kids and myself and we can't get it to our own Pub and we're happy about that we say well it looks like we're going to supporting our neighbor today and we're going to the Kebab place next door uh whereas if we just go to a local restaurant and have something to eat but that makes us proud you know we're not going to go in there and say hey will you make a space for us and I believe that our staff operate better when we're not there anyway you know they're not like oh they're looking over the shoulder at us sir they're not looking over the shoulder worrying about about us being there so we're happy uh we're happy to when our places are full and busy we're happy to just leave them be and we try not to be there late at night and just kind of let them run over themselves uh then we had Smith's in Gastown so Smith's used to be the Irish header the Irish header was in Gaston there for 23 years and it's right next to the Blarney store um to always kras Street uh the Shamrock I should say is on 1185 Denman Street so it's just demon and Davey just in from the corridor they're close to the Starbucks and the uh The Marble Slab ice cream place but um The Smiths is a fantastic bear it's got a bear a lounge we took that over from our good friend Sean Heather um probably a year and a half ago Sean is a really good guy in a great uh Publican here in the city um an Irish man as well and uh we renovated it added a lounge uh there's a really cool cocktail and whiskey barrel at the back it used to be called the shabeen um but now we call it the forge and we have so many events there we could have 250 events there a year um it was about 60 people um but it's spectacular is it mostly weddings uh yes we've had uh both um people have recorded podcasts in there um lots of birthday parties engagement parties um yeah lots of just lots of private parties um the White Caps score there the players and have uh events after after they won the uh the cop a couple of weeks ago they all went down there players and and supporters and staff and and had a great time but it's a beautiful space so if if you haven't checked it out check it out it's it's um it's special it's like a speakeasy um type of type of a room and then uh next we opened up um The Raven and Deep Cove so the Raven is uh just before you come into deepkoff on the crossroad there and it's legendary it's been there for uh it was the amberlin first 1949 and then in 1979 it changed to the Raven and uh it's a real neighborhood Pub um we have 100 seats downstairs in the lounge we're building another little snug up on the street level that we hope to have open in the next month or so and uh then we have some a nice private party room upstairs as well but it's a beautiful place and the locals love it does a lot of food there it's probably the only Pub I've ever operated that does more food than liquor so it operates a bit more like a restaurant um but it's it's a fantastic place then we opened up heinzes in kitsalano down on Broadway and Waterloo between Collingwood and Waterloo um across the street from a call number there or the Eatery and that's a beautiful place as well it's interesting that these are all in very different and very strategic locations they are yes we wanted to which one is your favorite place to um I don't have a favorite and I mean this and I'm not saying that to keep everybody happy I don't have a favorite I enjoy every single one of them and they all have a very special uh place in our heart uh heinz's um we it's a beautiful place um smaller uh we wanted to we wanted to just kind of open up a small little cozy neighborhood bear in kitaleno and I think we we've done that lots of people have said to me I've I go in the door of heinzes and I feel like I'm transformed to a little pub in Ireland and that's exactly what we wanted to do and all credit must go to Laura and my wife because she's our interior designer um helped with our uh friend Daria who does a lot of interior design for us as well but Laura comes up with the colors and the memorabilia that goes on the wall and and uh all the picture frames and she really does a spectacular job and people feel like they're at home the Irish when they're in heinzes or in Smith's or in darlands they feel like they're in Galway or Dublin or Corker Donegal yeah so that's then when you when you hear that from your customers you know that okay we've done you're doing good job right yeah uh are you looking at expanding we are more yeah we are we have uh what are you working on we have a couple more on the pipeline and which one is more fun the pubs or the construction work they're very different but more fun is probably uh the pops you know because you got music you got dancing you got beer you know yeah that wouldn't work on the construction site but anybody this uh is passionate about construction you know that's special too like when I'm on site so the camera working closely with our team and we work really hard and we button up those farms and the concrete truck backs up and the pump is set up and you start pumping that concretion you're working hard for 12 hours without a break and then there's the finished product and it's beautiful and you executed that uh nicely there's no better feeling you know um so it's just it's just a great feeling of achievement so they're very different things but uh I love the construction as well um you know sometimes when I'm in the office uh I'm thinking I wish I was out on site today you know sun is shining and and even if it was raining it wouldn't bother me I just loved being on site uh it's good fun as well on site which when you're working with the right people you know people with the right attitude and they're cracking jokes and you know uh telling stories and that's important too you know it builds it builds your team and then when people get out really well and they're all wrong in the same direction you know for the one common goal uh you'll have a lot of success and and that's very important so you're running all these businesses and you still have three small children yes we do yeah so again a lot of credit has to go to my wonderful wife Laura and uh I must mention our our Nanny uh as well Vicky she's Brazilian she's spectacular and the kids love her and uh she loves them and she's been a brother fresher she's with us for probably for all of the time for four or five years now um and we couldn't do without her because our family are in Ireland um and it's it's hard we have nine companies and we have as you said three young kids and it's a very very busy life and your kids are what one three and five one three and five three boys they're probably too young for this but what values are you looking forward to passing on to them one thing when I bring them to school with some Laurens or pick them up from school or if I I try to bring them to the playground in the evening they love that and there's some beautiful playgrounds in the South Falls Creek area there we always have a chat and I try and I'm trying to teach them something very small so I I just have sayings and I say it's very important to be and then finish off kind so they'll say little things like that and they learn them in their head then because you're kind of you're getting them involved you're including them in in that little slogan or that little quash um and it's very important to be to be kind you know and then I'll also say what my mom used to say it costs nothing to be and they'll say kind so just to teach them a little little you know golden nuggets like that of information that they can bring with them through their life and that they'll remember and they often say it to me now you know our oldest uh he's five now and he's actually at Arts umbrellas today he loves the the acting and the drama and he's funny he's a bit of a character so he's just added that great age you know and he will say them to me you know so he'll say different quotes back to me and I'll have to say kind you know so uh just to try and uh teach them to be good uh to have manners to be polite uh um and to be kind just simple little things how about to be hard working like Mommy and Daddy do you touch that as well or are they more comfortable no we do teach Dash and I think uh they see that for themselves you know and I try so I try like not to be on my phone all the time when I'm around them you know I make an effort to leave my phone aside uh Sunday is Family Day uh today we have the event I also we're here on recording the podcast it's also Father's day as well uh they made me breakfast early this morning so very grateful for that um but uh typically on Sunday we'll take Sundays off and it'll be family day and we'll spend the day together I will do fun things and it has to be fun right so we'll go out to Southlands to see our horse out there with a horse out there that we brought from Ireland actually Laura and her dad bred that horse for me for a surprise for our wedding in 2014 and I went over and they brought me down the field and said this is your wedding gift and I was overjoyed and then now we flew that horse to Canada on an Air Canada flight imagine so she's in Southlands now in South Granville area down on Marine Drive and we go down there regularly to see to see her the kids love the horses and and they love to get out and see the animals and it's we're still in the city but you feel like you're in the country when you go out there that's only 10 minutes away so we'll go out there and we'll put the saddle on the horse and do a bit of horse riding or we'll go for a stroll and then we might go for some ice cream and we'll go to the playground and we'll have as much fun as we can and it's very important to spend that quality time with them did you picture this live when it came almost 15 years ago no definitely not no but I I did know that I would work for myself because I was yeah and look Nothing is for sure but uh I was an entrepreneur from a very young age I started my first business when I was 19. I've always worked for myself I did work for Jacob Brothers in contact when I came here first but um would I have stayed with Jacob Brothers I don't know they treated me so well it would have been hard to leave but I was always like you know a Serial entrepreneur I I have a lot of energy and I enjoy what I do it doesn't seem like work to me you know I said earlier uh find what you love and call it work you'll never work a day in your life and I truly believe that like I don't know if today is Sunday or Tuesday because I'm just living life I'm happy to be alive I'm healthy I'm I'm happy I've got three beautiful kids a beautiful wife um we got very successful uh businesses and we got a good standard of living you know there's not much more that we need and you have hundreds of people and we in Europe we have won your companies that are actually part of our families that's our family and we call that the IRL family we refer to that all the time as our when we say our family it's the IRL family you know uh what would you tell immigrants that would be the first I don't know two or three most important things that they should pay attention to when they are coming to Canada I think think big you know and uh have uh big goals and ambitions if people are not laughing at your goals they're not goals at all you know I have goals where I uh want to have a billion dollars in real estate you know that's I have goals by 2028 I want to have IRL as a 200 million dollar a year company you know um and I'm sure there's people in our office and they're kind of like is he crazy but that you have to think big you have to dream big if you don't have goals like that they're they're not goals you know so push yourself and I've always had I've always had goals you know one three five year you know uh goals and recently I was asked uh I was over on on the island and I was at a CEO uh Retreat we went away for three days kind of like a think break with our coaches and uh 14 of us we do that once a year and um they asked us to look back at some of our goals and I look back at my goals and I've achieved most of them and and like when I set them I thought that these were crazy like you know I'll have three pubs you know I'll have nine companies like the these that we we actually achieved most of our goals so you know the bigger the goals the better and you push yourself life is short life is very short and uh something I say to um people that I talk to or if I'm ever against guest speaker or even to our our teams all the time it's like uh I refer to Oprah and what she said about business and uh I really live by this um the two most important rules of business number one is don't sweat the small stuff don't be worrying about the small stuff you know one time I would and number two is it's all it's all smart stuff and it is you know businesses can be replaced I've had many a business that wasn't successful I opened up a fast food takeaway in Granville Street I lost half a million dollars I'll never make that mistake again it was probably one of the best learning curves I ever had I went on to open up four more uh places in the restaurants after that you know don't be afraid of failure if you're not failing you're not trying hard enough but sometimes people feel like if I fail people will you know they'll be looking at me laughing at me people are not interested in what you're doing they're not looking at you that's probably what you think in your head you know don't don't fuel the fire your mind is so is so powerful uh look at Conor McGregor you mentioned them earlier I'm not a big fan but love them or hate them look at look at what are you doing uh he said from day one I'm going to be world champion I'm going to hold multiple beds he was a skinny little kid from Dublin he had no job he was a plumber he got laid off now he's probably one of the most famous people in the world you know flying around to play some private jets and like he did it he did it because he kept telling himself every day I'm going to do it I'm going to do it got all the best I'm gonna hold multiple beds at the same time you know so it's I think if we knew how powerful our minds were we wouldn't have negative thoughts at all but we're not there yet but hopefully someday we'll get there is there anything else that you would suggest immigrants would say to pay attention to putting yourself out there networking is very important here in Vancouver so coming to a new city go out get out meet people get in front of people um I think business is all about trust and relationships so how how do you build that trust how do you create those relationships um and I think the answer is probably networking getting out there get in front of the the the people that you want to be uh you want to be like you know find the people that have done what you want to do and ask them how did they get there you know is there anything they do differently um and learn from that experience what about those people that had Big Dreams or maybe not so big but you know meaningful dreams and along the way life happened and they just gave up on those dreams what would you tell to those people well you know if they say if you never give up you never fail so um I I think that's what happened to us when we opened the fast food restaurant in Granville Street we didn't give up you know we subleased that space we got out and we took on another challenge but we didn't give up and life is too short to give up you know um we had we have three cases you know and the three of them were preemies so they were all very very small when they were born early was two months early Turner was six weeks early and Shay then came like seven nearly eight weeks early again so those were scary times and you know when we started trying to have kids we weren't able to have kids so um that just put things into perspective like taking a chance dreaming big and taking a chance uh those are small things you know um don't be afraid to fail uh have have big Ambitions and big goals set targets for yourself and the sky is the limit uh you can put you can do absolutely anything if you put your mind to it I believe that um and that's I think advice I'd give to people coming over here I came over here um with Laura and we didn't have much but we had a good attitude we worked really really hard and we surrounded ourselves with good people and I think that was the The Key to Our Success you know those three things we worked hard we're doing the best that we could every day we hung out with people who were uh kind and positive and caring and uh they had you know the same attitude as ourselves and that really helped us to get where we are today there's no doubt about that that's the perfect way I think to finish this episode I'm so grateful for for you coming here on Father's Day on a Sunday morning I know you have to run we've been talking for for a long time now thank you so much William I think it was very very inspiring for especially for people who have already been pursuing their dreams but they're not quite there yet it's so easy to give up easiest and there's so many great great reasons to give up right which we call excuses People Like Us that's right yeah no Lucas thank you very much for having me on your podcast it's been an absolute pleasure oh thank you William and thank you for watching or listening to this episode if you're watching it on YouTube please remember to like it to subscribe to our Channel and also to share this video or this podcast with whoever you think would also like to learn a little bit from William's Journey thank you so much and I'll see you on the next episode foreign

Channel: Canadian Dream Podcast

Views: 704

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Id: L8Uj31ND-wE

Length: 64min 45sec (3885 seconds)

Published: Fri Aug 04 2023