The Kingsway - Islington : Innovation + Job News

Pop-up shops are often associated with higher-end retail: up-and-coming designers stocking small spaces with collections that get snapped up quickly. Recently, Goodwill and Newcomer Women's Services Toronto (NEW) launched a pop-up shop with a very different vibe: their inventory consists of one-of-a-kind products, created by participants in NEW's green entrepreneurship program, out of materials provided by Goodwill.

The women who created the recycled and repurposed products—marketed under a line dubbed Good as New—were participating in one of NEW's self-employment training programs.

The idea arose when some of the participants expressed a particular interest in sewing, says the program's faciliator, Deepa Premnath, and the products include clothing, jewelry, and other accessories. The program's goal is to help give participants the skills ito start home-based businesses; the pop-up shop's goal, meanwhile, is to spread the word about that program, and also to give the designers a trial run—a chance to market test their products and see how they sell.

"Our goal in general is to connect people to resources around the idea of self-employment," says Premnath. She freely admits, "it is not a panacea for all employment ills, but one possibility" in a volatile employment market, and one that can be particularly accessible for newcomers, who often face disproportionate challenges entering the workforce.

You can find the Good as New pop-up shop at the Goodwill Islington South Community Store (871 Islington Avenue, Etobicoke).

Writer: Hamutal Dotan
Source: Deepa Premnath, Program Facilitator, Green Entrepreneurship Program, Newcomer Women's Services Toronto
Photo: Courtesy of Goodwill

"Years ago, I was a hired general contractor," says Gary LaRose, "and I got a commission to do a wine cellar."

The experience of the building project sparked a love affair with wine, he says, leading him to take "about 10 wine courses and become an avid collector." His passion and his business merged when 17 years ago he decided to specialize in building wine cellars, founding Rosehill Wine Cellars.

That collected experience led him finally to the recent opening of a dedicated wine-rack manufacturing facility in Mississauga, the first of its kind in Canada, unveiled publicly through press announcements this month after two years of preparations and testing.

"It takes a while to set it all up," LaRose says, noting the gradual collection of robotics and computer design equipment. Now the facility is operating at full speed, serving custom orders from across Canada and around the world. Rosehill may soon start seeking dealer arrangements with agents to compliment its online sales and Toronto retail store. "I didn't want to do this until the factory was ready," LaRose says.

At the factory and in Rosehill's Etobicoke retail location, LaRose now employs 17 staff in what is a growing, highly specialized area of industrial home design. "It's actually a very specialized subfield," he says. "You have to think like a wine collector—what types of wines will it house, the size of the bottles, displays.... Some people buy only by the case, some have lots of magnums of champagne, some will have no magnums. And then you need to know how to refrigerate the room, and build your racking all around it."

He says Rosehill has grown with the growing interest in food and drink appreciation over the past decade.

"At one time the people who would hire us were avid collectors looking to make a perfect home for their collections," he says. "Now it's quite a lot of people who just have a big home and are interested in starting a collection—they want to build the home first and add the wine collection later."

Writer: Edward Keenan
Source: Gary LaRose, Owner, Rosehill Wine Cellars