A Coffee With Don and Jan from Mprint Sign and Print Solutions

Join us for a coffee and chat with Don and Jan from Mprint Sign and Print Solutions. From their humble beginnings in the Grassland and moving around the province to how they got into the Printing Industry. Don and Jan are wonderful examples of resilience; opening a business during the Pandemic, dealing with the uncommon and everchanging requests of customers, unexpected life changes. With a big emphasis on family and connections they have created a shop that feels like home and every customer is treated equally regardless of the project.

Transcript

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Well, hello, everybody, and welcome to another edition of the ABA Coffee In The Park. My name is Cam Milliken, and I am here with the extraordinary co-host, Jennifer Herrick, the Acheson Business Association Director. Wait a minute. Wait a minute. I always get that wrong. You know what, this happens, like, Cam. I know, every podcast. You work with me. The extraordinary Jennifer Herrick, the Acheson business Association Executive Director. All right. Welcome, Jennifer. Thanks, Cam. How are we this morning? We're doing great. A little tanked up on coffee because we are here at... We are in the Wall Coffee Roasters, as everybody is used to listening to us from, except for last week, Cam, when we were on the road of Bushell Transport. That's right. We did a roadshow last week. We did a roadshow. But we want to say that we are at the Wall Coffee Roasters in beautiful downtown Acheson. That's right. So we're here and we're very excited about today. Things are good. You're doing all right? I'm doing good. Great. Want to tell us about some of our sponsors? I do. I'd like to thank our gold corporate sponsors, which include the MyShak Group of companies, Genics and of course, Parkland County. these businesses are great supporters of the Acheson Business Association, and we're so thrilled to have them as sponsors. That's right. Whom without them, we would not be able to do what we do. So thank you very much. So we're really excited. Things are good. Life is good. Getting back to normal. Well, school starts next week. Oh, your son's going back to school. He's going back to school. Where did summer go? I don't know, but you know what? Fall is going to be coming soon. The weather is changing a little bit. But hey, every season is exciting. So I'm looking forward to a little bit of fall as well. And today, tell us about today. Well, Cam, I am so excited for today's guests. these two individuals are some of my favorite individuals in the entire world. They're awesome. They sure are. So I am so excited to introduce Jan and Don, who are the co-owners of Mprint Sign and Print Solutions. Right here in Acheson. In Acheson. Welcome, guys. Thanks for having us. Yeah, good to have you. This is exciting. We're glad that you're here. We are. And Jan, I know sometimes you're a little reluctant to, you know, kind of do this. She's shy. Jan is a little shy. Yeah, she's shy. You never know. No, but she won't be shy today. She won't be shy today. No, no. So thanks for doing this. Yeah. And we're just excited you guys are here. And as you know, Coffee In The Park is the story behind the story. We think you guys have a great story. You have a great business. You really do amazing work. We know that. If you ever see our coffee mugs or anything on our social media, Mprint did our mugs for us and does a lot of our work for us. So thank you for doing that. We really appreciate that. But tell us, your brother and sister, is that right? That is correct. Who's older? Don is older. Although growing up, people often thought we were twins. Really? Well, let's just stick with the twins thing. That's good. I like that. But then I lose out on the wiser part. Okay. Well, I got nothing to say about that. Tell us a little bit about Don and Jan growing up. Where did that happen? How did that happen? Give us a little insight on that. Yeah. So we actually had a unique childhood where we, our parents separated when we were very young. And so we ended up moving from country home into city home. And then as we got older, Don remained in the city, whereas I headed back up north out into the country. So yeah, we kind of, you know, went our separate ways, obviously remaining very close as family. But yeah, I would like to say our influential years, we grew up very differently. Okay, where up north? Yeah, where? Not too far, a little small place called Grassland. Grassland. Which is halfway between here and Fort McMurray. Yeah, right on. Cool. Yeah, and to be honest, I loved it. I took advantage of the best of both worlds. So, you know, we had the country, the farm home, we had the city home and moved back and forth. And yeah, both, you know, rural and urban lifestyles. So yeah, it was great, actually. Cool. awesome. Now, you are currently both in the print industry. However, it was not always the case, especially Jan, I know with you. Tell us a little bit about your journey and some of the exciting things that I know you've done over the years. Yeah, he's laughing. Oh, it should be good. Yeah. So I graduated high school with not a clear indication of what I wanted to do in life. And so my dad and I kind of lived in a small community college in Lac La Biche and they had a forestry program there. It was an eight month certificate program. So I took the program, loved it, and I ended up working in forestry for about 10 years doing cut block lay out, planning, regen surveys, supervision, things like that. So some really neat experiences with wildlife and different crew members, wildfire and all that good stuff. I then married an entrepreneur and I got the bug for owning businesses. So we moved up to Fort McMurray and I worked for the government for a little while there. And then I opened up the first bone and biscuit, which is a pet supply franchise. Really? yes. Pet supplies? Yeah, pet supplies. Cool. Cam, it's a booming business. Yeah, no doubt. And a little bit of backstory on that is while I was in forestry, my co-worker and I, we would find stray animals out of the bush and we would pick them up, we'd fix them and we would find them homes. Like a rescue. Well, that's how Second Chance Animal Rescue Society got started actually. So yeah. Wow. So that kind of, yeah, you know, kind of remained in that pet industry. And then my husband ended up getting cancer. And just decided it was enough. He had a trucking company up there and he, he just wanted to go home. Right. So we ended up selling that business, moved back to Grassland. And I missed the pet industry. So I ended up opening a couple little pet stores, one in Athabasca, one in Lac La Biche. Yeah. And it got into a situation where, you know, I had to let those go, unfortunately, but still remained on the entrepreneur path. And so yeah, we flipped businesses for a while. We opened car washes. We had a liquor store at one point. Jan, I didn't know this about you. This is so awesome. Yeah. So as you can see, we moved around quite a bit. We actually counted the other day. I think we had seven homes together so far. So yeah. So we now are currently living out in Sturgeon County, and my husband no longer has businesses of his own, other than we have an RV storage place. But yeah, so now we have Mprint. Okay. So yeah. Don? Yeah. Don, was your journey always in printing? My journey was always in printing, a little different than Jan's. She's more of the change junkie than I am. I like that word, change junkie. Yeah. You're the stable one, is what you're saying. You're the, yeah, okay. Yeah. Yeah. I wouldn't say that, but Jan is, outside looking in probably. Right. Yeah. So, no, I, after graduating high school, I really didn't know what I wanted to do. And a family friend owned a print shop in Edmonton. And, you know, I went looking for a summer job. He said, you know, really? I've got a position, but you're going to cost me money for the first six to eight months. So it's long term or no term. Yeah. Why not? Right. So day one, I went in there, I had no idea what the job entailed, what the industry was about. But in those days, it was very hands-on, very analogue, and I had a good skill for it. It was a craft. And really, a lot of printers will tell you, it gets in your blood. And so, yeah, here we are 30 some years later. And I tried to cap it at 20 years. People say, how long have you been in the industry? I said, well, 20 years, but it's... But you started when you were 10, so you know, right? Yeah, so, yeah, so, yeah. So, you know, through the industry all those years and the industry has changed a lot, which, you know, with the, you know, computer manufacturing processes and, you know, even the change in how people view and, you know, take in their content. This podcast is a case in point. But the industry has changed and adapted and flowed. And for me, that's always been exciting, right? Because we've been able to adapt and change with it. And when we started Mprint, it was those changes in the industry was kind of the foundation that we built Mprint on. So, you know, what does print look like moving forward? So tell us a little bit about the coming together. How did brother and sister decide to go into business together? Because is... Yeah, so that's actually an interesting story. I started out, I was working with a geosynthetic liner company and we moved into Acheson. I think we moved in 2018. So I've been in that building for quite a while. And then when COVID hit, we ended up laying off our shop staff. And at the same time, Don was working at a place where they ended up closing their doors. So it was, we had all this space and it was like, what are we going to do with all of this space? And you know, we just, I, really, I'm just still amazed at how it all came together and how it just, we literally did not expect it to blow up like it has. We just slapped our sign on the wall and opened the door and that sign is still there. During COVID? During COVID. No less. And I mean, Cam, we've talked about this with so many of our guests. Yeah. Of what happened during COVID. How did that affect you as a new business? Well, thankfully, the print industry was considered an essential service. Really? Okay. So you didn't have to close down. You didn't have to... You could come to work every day. All that kind of stuff. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So we did. We kind of got set up and enrolling just the two of us. Yeah. And out of the gate, we had a couple of good supporters, local in Acheson as well, who really helped us hit our stride. Right. You know, but lots of challenges starting up during COVID was, I mean, for us, our initial conversation was, hey, do you wanna? And I was like, yeah, sure. Let's. Right. So really, I just want to stop there. So how does that happen? Are you like, are you sitting over coffee one day or beer or whatever it was? And somebody says, one of you says, let's go into business together. And so how does that just, I'm curious how that happens. Especially as siblings. That's right. Like, yeah. Obviously, you get along. Yeah, we've always gotten along really well. So was it like, were you eating one day? Or did you just phone Don one day and say, let's go into, how did that happen? How did that happen? I think like for myself, because I had been an employee for a couple of years, I was like, I'm done. I'm ready. I miss being a business owner. And you know, him being in the industry, I knew nothing about print. Absolutely nothing. But what I did know is I knew how to open and run businesses. So we just kind of, you know, we had two and two together. You had business mind and understanding of print come together. And yeah. Yeah, and credit to Jan. I mean, the industry has a lot of moving parts. There's a lot of different products that we produce and different ways to produce them, different materials, and it's a lot of information. Wow. So Mprint started. Where is it going? Where is it come? How have you done over the past, what? Two, three years, four years? Well, thankfully, we don't have to worry about COVID anymore. So that was a good base for us. And we learned some good, but challenging lessons. You know, Supply line issues. You quote something three days later, that material is no longer available and things like that. But it really was a good foundation for us. And so, I mean, year two, we had doubled our sales from the first year. Year three, I think we were up another 40%. This year, we're trending in the same direction. And, you know, so it's been, it's really been grow, grow, grow, which is, which has been great. But again, some challenges, right? We have to be able to handle that. I mean, with that growth, there's always challenges. It's exciting, but maybe just share some of the challenges that, you know, growth you're experiencing. Yeah, I think for us really, I mean, staffing is, you know, right now, it's such a specialized industry and to have a skill set. And, you know, I would consider it almost a trade and to have the younger generation, you know, gaining an interest. I mean, there's a lot of graphic designers out there, but to find someone with the skill set to do the actual finishing of the wide production is the challenge where we're at right now. But we have a great team behind us. We've got two full time and two part time, one being Don's daughter. Okay. And they've been, yeah, it's a bit of a girl-powered Mprint right now, which is amazing. But Don, outnumbered, are you? Yeah, four to one, four to one, whatever we are, four and a half to one at least. I love it. That's great. But it's good. It's good. And, you know, great, great culture there. It's fun to walk into the building every morning. And there's a lot of laughs. So tell us everything, not everything, but a lot of what you do, the services you offer, because people think printing, well, you just, you print, you know, something. You guys do way more than that. Tell us a little bit about what does Mprint do. Yeah, so my background was actually in the sheet fed kind of offset side of things. So business cards, books, brochures. And then I moved into the wide format signage industry. And so when we started Mprint, I really didn't feel like we could offer one without the other. Most businesses need both. And they really are two different industries. And so for us, when we invested in our equipment and our flow, it was with that in mind. So, you know, different supply lines, different equipment, different processes. But what that's done is enabled us to really become a, you know, fairly full service printer, right? And so, yeah, so that's been great. So the products we offer, everything from business cards to multi hundred page books to, you know, on vehicle graphics, and we've wrapped everything from vehicles to boats to ATVs. You wrapped our boat. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. The Herrick boat. Yeah. And yeah, we did a couple of airplanes. And yeah, wow. You know, so we don't really shy away from things. You know, because we have such a wide diversified portfolio, when somebody comes in to us with a unique product or project, it's the question is really, you know, OK, can we do this? And can we do it effectively? And yeah, and I want to I want to just give you a little shout out here because our company, Genics, we use you for, for just about everything. And print wise, and we come to you and say, can you do this? You've never once said to us, I don't think we can do that. You've always said, we'll figure it out. And you've done it. And you've done it. You do it awesomely like it. Is that a word? awesomely. Anyway, you do it amazingly. It's incredible. So, yeah, you guys are you're an incredible. You do an incredible job. You're incredible business and you've never turned down any requests we've had. And that's amazing to me. I would agree. And that's personally and professionally. I went to them, not last year, but the year before and said, hmm, could you wrap a goalie helmet for me? My son was deciding to be a goalie and they did. I think it was your first one that you wrapped. I know Jan, it was great. He loved it. It's still in our basement now. He's proudly displaying it. So again, you guys are amazing. Everything you do, it's incredible. And it's cool to hear the story. And I know there's been some challenges along the way. Life hasn't always been easy. I mean, any business owner would attest to that. I'm sure life has not always been. And even personally, you've had some struggles. And Don, I know we've become aware of your daughter and her cancer. And do you want to talk just a little bit about it? Because I think it's an amazing story. And I don't mean to put you on the spot, but we love her and we've supported her and watched your journey with her. And I'm sure that wasn't easy as well. Running a business and going through that. Well, and thanks for that, Cam. That's great to hear. And I could probably talk for hours about her. But really, the short story is she was a pretty normal, active 12-year-old girl and ended up with back pain one day. And, you know, she was active again, sports, club soccer player. And so we said, you know, kind of suck it up and we'll, you know, you'll get through this. And three days later, she was diagnosed with leukemia. And they started treatment the next day. She had surgery and was in. And then unfortunately, her leukemia is an extremely rare leukemia. It's got a chromosome switch marker on it that makes it extremely hard to cure. And with kids, pediatric, they really talk about cure. And really most likely, really more likely to come back. So her treatment plan was very aggressive and very challenging. And, but she got through it. And it was a couple of years of, you know, I think in those two years, she was in the Stollery for almost 350 days. But we got through it. And she was, yeah, in remission for almost five years, all set to go to Hawaii for a year of college there. She was going to Hawaii there, yeah. Yeah, and her blood tests, you know, blood work going in, they found that it had come back. So now she was 18. And again, you know, they say after five years, the likelihood of it coming back is extremely rare. Well, and unfortunately, this was just shy of that. So she was, it was really a chapter behind us. Yeah, so yeah, so the treatment plan for this one, they said really bone marrow transplant is the only way to go. So that's, that was about six months in Calgary. They found a good donor. So that was great. And yeah, so she got through that and then unfortunately it has come back again. So yeah, so I mean, even now she's on a daily dose of chemo and effectively in remission, which is great. But it's, the bone marrow transplant is about a three year recovery. And so she's unable to work or go to school or do those things. Yeah. However, she does come in and work for Mprint a couple of afternoons a week. And I can tell you that those afternoons sometimes turn into evenings. And she is not only very good at what we do, but yeah, she's, she's all heart and soul in. So yeah, so it's been really, really good to watch and see. Yeah, yeah, what a journey. Yeah, that's incredible. And I again, you know, we, we always say that Coffee In The Park is the story behind the story of business people. And, and I appreciate so much you sharing that with us and telling us about that. And I can't imagine you're running a business, a startup business at that. Your families are going through these kinds of things. How does that, how do you balance all that? Like, how do you, I... You know, if there was about 36 hours in the day instead of 24, it would be easier. But, you know, during that bone marrow transplant time, I was in Calgary every weekend, so a lot of miles back and forth, you know, plus you have to, you have to zip down there when there's something that's not quite going the way it's supposed to be going. And you know what, our, our staff and our customer and Jan, especially, super supportive, right? And, and, you know, there's, yeah, it's just been a really good community around us. And that's been super important to otherwise, yeah, running the business, it would probably be impossible, honestly. Yeah, yeah. I find it a privilege right now. I'll sit in my office and Kate is mostly in the wide format room in the back, and she's, she's the boss back there. She owns that position. I love it. But I always say like this time with her and Don is so precious and it's an honor for me to be able to observe it. Yeah. No, yeah, I understand that. And yeah, that's, it's, you know, it's one of those things that I think, when we think of a business, I don't think people stop to realize all of the ins and outs of the people behind that business and that you're dealing with things every day, that, you know, you have to put on a brave face and, you know, work and deal with your customers. But that's really hard sometimes. Yeah, life is, life is difficult and a lot of people I don't think see, well, obviously they don't see it, you know, their customers, whatever, they have no idea what's going on behind closed doors. And you guys have just done so remarkably well. What's the future for Mprint? Do you have, is it just any big plans or thoughts you want to share? You want a breaking news right here on ABA? Yeah, Coffee In The Park. You're expanding to, I don't know, anything. What's the future of Mprint? Well, more of the same, right? Our focus is on providing a great customer service. We really, really like that, the relational side of the business. We like to get to know our customers. But yeah, I mean, there's areas of Acheson we haven't introduced ourselves yet too. So we're really, yeah, we're looking forward to expanding our Acheson customer base. And we do service customers all over the, you know, Greater Parkland, Edmonton region. And, you know, we think we've hit a formula that works. So it's, yeah, it's go mode for us. It's growth mode where we're excited to come in every day and see what projects are going to come down the pipe. So, yeah. Listen, Acheson businesses, if you have not, that's right, been to Mprint, get down there. What are you waiting for? Yeah, exactly. And I'm telling you, as a customer, they do the best. So anyway, you need to use them. You do need to use them. You need to call them, call Mprint. Call Mprint. Yeah. What's the website? What's your website? www.Mprint.ca. There you go, www.Mprint.ca. Yeah, give them a call. Well, so we're going to put you both on the spot. This is the final question we like to ask each of our guests. So I'm going to ask each one of you. Jan we will start with you and then Don, I'll ask you. So what is the best piece of advice you've been given, either personally or professionally, that you carry with you still to this day? You should have let him go first. They're twins, remember? honestly, okay, so here's the truth. I really don't stop and think. I kind of just do. I do and then I figure it out as I go along. So yeah, you know, I don't think I would change anything. And you know, I wouldn't, I just keep trucking along. That's all you do. Keep your head up. Keep treading water. Sure. Okay. See, and I thought it was going to be an easy question. Like what's your favorite color? To which I would say, you know, obviously Pantone 348 Green is a great one. But anyways, yeah, I think the advice I've received is, especially as a small business owner, is that it's not going to be easy. And while there's going to be some valleys, there's going to be lots of peaks, so persevere. Just persevere. Yeah. What is that? Chew like hell? Yeah, bite off more than you can chew and then chew like hell. I noticed Jan said that away from the mic and then expected you to say it. I think that's great advice. Well, that's awesome. Well, you guys, honestly, you know, I think I can say it for Jennifer and I, you're two of our favorite people in Acheson. We love you, not just for Mprint and what you do, but both of you as well. You are amazing people. And we were pretty excited about today. And honestly, folks, we're not kidding. If you need some print, have some printing needs, these are the folks to call without a doubt. They come very highly recommended. They're professional. They'll take care of you. And so we encourage you to check it out. And thank you both for taking the time to do this. We really appreciate it. We do really appreciate it. We really do. Thank you. Yeah. Yeah. And thanks for having us. It's been a lot of fun. Yeah. Thanks. Jennifer, some things coming up. You want to tell us about them? Some things coming up. Nominations for the business Awards. Gala close Friday. Oh, yeah. Done. Can't nominate anybody. Can't nominate anybody. But record number of nominations coming in. I'm so excited for this year's Gala. Tickets are on sale at achesonbusiness.com. We are also having a Welcome Back from Summer, Coffee In The Park networking event here at the ABA parking lot. Food truck event. Food truck. Lots of food trucks. Very excited. Food truck. Love food trucks. And some fun prizes. So stop by on September 5th from 11 a.m.

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30 p.m. 27717 Acheson Road. That's right. And so the gala, September 28th, the food truck event is September 5th. And so lots going on in Acheson. And if you need to find out more information, you can go to www.achesonbusiness.com. You can also download our podcast on the website. That's right. You don't even have to know how to figure out Apple or Spotify. So we know there are some of you out there. You're not quite sure about this whole podcast on your phone thingamadoo. You come to the gala, cause we're going to do something very special at the gala where we're going to teach everybody, all 300 people how to download our podcast. That's it. It's going to be so exciting. I can hardly wait. I'm so excited. So yeah, that's where you can get all the information about not only the ABA, but all of our events. You can download our podcast. You can go to wherever you download your podcast and get it from there. And I just want to say thanks everybody. Again, if you hear all the noise in the background, that's because we're at the coffee shop. We're at the Wall Coffee Roasters. There's coffee being grounded, ground, ground, not grounded, ground, and lattes being made and all that kind of stuff. So if you have not been to the Wall Coffee Roasters, we would suggest that you come check it out. Absolutely. Great. Well, it was a fun week again. We'll see you all next week. Thanks, everybody. See you later.