Insights with Don Mills and David Campbell- An Acadia Broadcasting Podcast

It may surprise many that Tri-Star Industries, founded by Keith Condon in 1973, in Yarmouth, Nova Scotia have sold their customized ambulances to 46 foreign companies. Tri-Star has also supplied all the ambulances in Nova Scotia under a lease arrangement. The company has also sold ambulances to seven other provinces, just recently signing an agreement with Newfoundland & Labrador. Keith sold his interest in his company ten years ago to his senior management team, but remains active in the company in business development, now responsible for Central and South America with an office in Panama. During his career, he learned how to be able to sell in foreign countries, in the process meeting the royal family in Monaco, the King of Jordan, Saddam Hussein and even Fidel Castro. The secret to the long running success of the company is its ability to customize the vehicles built for their clients, which can cost up to $275,000 each. The company employs 85-90 people at its 55,000 sq ft facility, making it the largest private sector employer in the town. The company has been increasing the use of automation in its production processes to remain competitive. Tri-Star Industries is yet another Atlantic Canadian example of the region's ability to manufacture and compete in global markets, even from smaller rural communities.

On this week’s Insights podcast, Don and David are talking trade and tariffs with Dr. Herb Emery from the University of New Brunswick.  What will be the impacts specifically in our region?  How many jobs are at risk? What industries?  We spent a lot of time talking about solutions ranging from developing new foreign export markets to strengthening interprovincial trade and developing our natural resources.  Emery points to lessons from the past and highlights the fact that many of our economic challenges as a country pre-date President Trump.   In the end, Don makes a strong case that Canada has the potential to come out of this stronger than ever. 

 At the recent 2025 Seafarmers Conference sponsored by the Aquaculture Association of Nova Scotia, Don Mills and Bill Lahey, the President of King's College were the kick-off panel keynote speakers focused on the challenges and opportunities facing the sector. Jeff Bishop, the Executive Director for AANS was the guest host for this live recorded podcast. Bill was one of the co-authors "A New Regulatory Framework for Low Impact/High Value Aquaculture in Nova Scotia Report" which tackled one of the biggest challenges in the sector and provided practical recommendations to streamline and improve regulatory transparency. Our podcast with Glenn Cooke previously underscored the challenges of doing business in Nova Scotia in the aquaculture industry.  We discussed the current state of the regulatory process and what the industry needed to do to increase public support for this sector. This is yet another example of the challenges faced in developing our natural resources across Atlantic Canada.

Our guest on this episode of the Insights Podcast is Patrick Sullivan, the CEO of the Halifax Chamber of Commerce. The Halifax Chamber has nearly 2,000 members who employ 90,000 workers in the Greater Halifax Area. The Chamber is focussed on advocacy for its members with the three levels of government, providing a strong and independent voice for the business community. Its current key priorities are affordability (including tax reform), labour and infrastructure. Last year, the Chamber conducted more than a hundred events for its members, including its recent Annual Business Awards Gala, celebrating business excellence. The Chamber also offers educational programs and affinity services for its members including affordable group health benefits and insurance services. The vast majority of the Chamber's members are small business owners with less than 20 employees.

Our guest on this episode of the Insights Podcast is Carrie Cussons, the CEO of Events East, the special purpose government agency partnership between the Province of Nova Scotia and the Halifax Regional Municipality responsible for managing both the Halifax Convention Centre and Scotiabank Centre. There was considerable early criticism about the decision to build the new convention centre. The convention centre opened in December 2017 and, despite operating during a period that included Covid, has proven the critics wrong, attracting 3.3 million attendees at its facilities and generating economic benefits of between $100 and $125 million annually to the economy in Nova Scotia. The new convention centre is three times larger than the previous facility with 120,000 sq ft of available space. It can accommodate conferences for 3,000 people and multiple events at a time.  Before the new convention centre, between 4-5 national and international conferences were attracted to the city. In the coming year, 46 such events are scheduled. This underscores the importance of investment in public infrastructure like convention centres to stimulate economic activity and be a catalyst for development in the downtown core, as has happened in Halifax.

On this episode of the Insights Podcast, our guest is Greg Simpson, the President & CEO of Liverpool, NS-based Mersey Seafoods, a company most would know very little about. Mersey Seafoods was founded in 1964 by a dentist, Dr. Bill Murphy and a group of like-minded businesspeople. It was started to replace a fish plant that had been destroyed by fire and has since become one of Atlantic Canada's largest privately owned seafood companies. The family continues to be privately held by the Murphy family. The company has 700 employees and its own fishing fleet, and one of its ships can catch up to 10 million shrimp in a day. The company recently acquired additional scallop quota, raising its share of the quota to 13 percent. The company is becoming vertically integrated with its own processing facilities, retail and wholesale operations. The company recently acquired the well-known Fisherman's Market and has plans to expand that business. They recently acquired the Shelburne Ship Repair facility, driving growth on the marine repair side of the business.  It is a remarkable business success story that few will be aware of.

New Brunswick Premier Susan Holt joined Don and David on the Insights podcast this week. She is the province’s 35th premier and, while only been on the job for three months, is already facing an unexpected challenge, the threat of a prolonged trade war with the United States.  We talk about a wide range of issues from health care to immigration and long term economic development.  One interesting topic discussed is her focus on empowering the Cabinet.  Increasingly in New Brunswick and across Canada, decision making has been more and more centered in the Premier’s/Prime Minister’s Office.  It looks like Premier Holt wants to let her Ministers play a more important role.  For almost 20 years we have been talking about developing an electronic health record system for all New Brunswickers.  She seems convinced her government will finally get it done.  Municipal tax reform, housing and energy development are also covered in this conversation.  Well worth an hour of your time. 

Vision 2025 was an event held last week at the Nova Scotia Health Innovation Hub focussed on the growing opportunities for the life sciences and bio-science sector in Nova Scotia and featured presentations from four companies in this space including Oberland Agriscience and 3DBioFibR. The event was co-sponsored by GreenSpring BioInnovation Hub, IGNITE Atlantic and Life Sciences Nova Scotia. David and Don were the keynote speakers at the event and recorded a live podcast with Doug Jones, the Founder and CEO of Ignite as the guest host for the podcast, where they discussed the opportunities and challenges associated with growing this segment of the economy.

There is a good chance that you have not heard about Don MacDougall, but he is the person most credited by many for Toronto's Major League Baseball's franchise while he was the President of Labatt's Breweries, where he led the company from third place in market share to first place. He was also closely involved with the establishment of the Montreal Grand Prix and the Labatt Brier. He has been a serial entrepreneur including being the owner of Novatronics, a company with some involvement in the development of the Canadarm. He recently returned to his home province of PEI where he purchased the Mill River Resort and Eagles Glenn near Cavendish. He led the transformation of Slemon Park in Summerside after the closure of its military base to a thriving business park with more than $400 million in exports. He is a member of the Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame and the PEI Business Hall of Fame. He is also a past Chancellor of UPEI where their School of Business is named after him. It is an amazing story of business success and community involvement.

The Bertossi Group of restaurants is the largest privately owned group of fine dining restaurants east of Montreal. Stephanie and Maurizio Bertossi opened their first restaurant , the Perla in the 1980s.  Few who live in or have visited Halifax have not dined at one of their well-known restaurants that have been around for decades, including the Bicycle Thief, Ristorante a Mano, La Frasca and il Mercato Trattoria.The Group is owned by Hakan Uluer, a personable and ambitious immigrant originally from Istanbul. Uluer began as a dishwasher in his native Turkey before ending up in Halifax with his Nova Scotian born wife and working with the Bertossi where he eventually became first a partner and finally the owner. The secret of the Bertossi Group's longevity and success is attention to detail and consistency in service delivery, dining experience and food quality. Uluer recently opened two new restaurants on the Halifax waterfront, Water Pool and Matadoras, and now employs over 750 people with an expectation of growing that number to 1,000 by the end of 2025. It is a true entrepreneurial story.