Thanks for everything Dave @Letterman @ByeLetterman #ThanksDave

It’s been more than a year since David Letterman announced he would retire sometime in 2015. We’ve known today, May 20, would be the last day since December. Either way you cut it, that’s a long time to prepare for something, but nevertheless, as I wait for tonight’s final show, it seems like it all happened in a few short weeks.

            My DVR is jammed with dozens of recent shows. I’ve read everything I can find from smart critics and observers about Letterman’s legacy. I’ve spent more time on YouTube than the proud owners of a piano-playing cat. In short, I’m trying to soak in as much as I can before Letterman leaves my TV screen forever.

            There’s no shortage of articles and reminiscences about what Letterman has meant to his fans. Like millions of others, I started watching Late Night in high school, rarely lasting until the show ended at 1:30, but reveling in the first 30 minutes when most of the absurdist jokes, stunts and inventions came pouring out of the show at a breathtaking rate.

            If it seemed the pace of brilliance was unsustainable, well, it turned out to be exactly that. In recent years, the Late Show has been less irreverent, less absurd. And yet, as I watch the endless compilations of highlights, I’m reminded that much of what made NBC’s Late Night great transferred very nicely to CBS’s Late Show. Bits came and went, the Jimmys started playing beer pong and charades with their celebrity guests, and Jay Leno plodded along, winning the ratings race. But Letterman’s brilliance never faded.

            Yes, he mellowed after his heart surgery and the birth of his son. The man is 68, so it’s hardly surprising that his sensibilities and interests might have changed from the early days when he was in his mid-30s. What never changed, however, was the deep well of quips and reactions he delivered in any situation. Sure, his writers prepared some great lines for him, but his ability to say something funny in any circumstance, with pitch-perfect timing was and is unrivalled.

            The great Tom Shales, a Pulitzer-prize winning TV critic at the Washington Post for roughly as many years as Letterman was on the air, said exactly what I’ve been thinking for years. From time to time, I would record one of the Jimmys, or Seth, or Craig or, now, James. But that decision was based on what guests were scheduled to appear, what musician was playing to close the show.

            With Dave, it was different. He was his own best guest, Shales noted. It didn’t matter who was coming on with him, I wanted to see Dave every night and that’s why I watched. It’s why I watched for 33 years, and it’s why I’m going to miss him so very much. 

More on @BizLondon May cover @EllipsisDigital #LondonRoundhouse #LdnOnt

            Early in 2013, my daughter Emily was applying to universities and had to submit a series of photos in support of her application to the fine arts program at Ryerson in Toronto. The photos had to represent a theme, and she chose urban decay.

            I had just bought a new camera, so we set out together, cameras in hand, to see what we could find in downtown London. We spent most of a January Saturday tooling around exploring.

            Late in the afternoon, we stumbled across the former Great West Steak House on Horton Street. It was one ugly building -- exactly what we were looking for to demonstrate urban decay. Boarded up since 2007, it offered no clues to its fascinating past and certainly not to the renaissance it would enjoy in the spring of 2015, when hundreds of people would flock to an open house to celebrate the building’s restoration.

             As you can read about in this month’s Business London cover story, beautifully illustrated by Steve Martin’s photos, the building had been a railroad roundhouse, an architectural wonder constructed in 1887 by Michigan Central Rail to service and store hulking steam locomotives that were nearly impossible to move in reverse. The roundhouse was built around a giant turntable, allowing up to six locomotives to be turned and shunted off into service bays as required.

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            When it was no longer used for its intended purpose, the roundhouse went through a number of owners and uses, culminating with the Great West Steak House, which hid the glories of the building not so much under a bushel basket but under tons of wood panels, drywall and other detritus. 

            Underneath, however, the building always had good bones. That’s what interested the co-owners of Creative Property Development when they bought the property, along with 23 other properties in the SoHo (South of Horton) area. Patrick John Ambrogio and Slavko Prtenjaca met while attending Central high school, and slowly created their company without relying on any equity partners. They have a bunch of rental space on Richmond Row, but their SoHo developments take most of their time and energy.

            They love the area and are committed to restoring it, using Toronto’s high-tech Liberty Village as a template. Already SoHo has attracted a variety of creative and tech firms, most in buildings Creative Property has renovated. The London Roundhouse is the largest project of all, however. The multi-stage project will cost the partners something north of $10-million. And they’ve proposed a commercial and residential tower as the final phase at a cost of $45-million.

            The key to developing the 5,500 square feet in the Roundhouse itself was finding the right tenant. Ellipsis Digital and its sister company, Engine SevenFour, were the ideal match. Operating as rtraction when they toured the building in 2013, the three partners signed up eagerly. It might have helped that they didn’t know the extent of what they were getting into, but now that it’s complete, they are thrilled with their decision.

            Sure, the project can be called a renovation. But that word suggests some new paint here, crown molding there, maybe a new countertop and appliances. The Roundhouse project is better described as a rebuild: Besides the majestic beams holding the place up, virtually everything else is new. It took a year longer than planned, but it looks fantastic.

            The larger project will continue for several years, initially adding more office space in a circle around the Roundhouse itself. Among the new tenants scheduled for 2016 is Royal LePage Triland Real Estate, led by two of the most pleasant men in real estate: Peter Hoffman and Peter Meyer.

            The final phase might be more of a dream than reality at the moment. Given the timetable for phase one, it’s tough to believe a 15-25 storey tower will be up by 2020. If it’s even approved by then, it will be impressive.

            In the meantime, the Roundhouse stands as testament to what passion and determination can deliver. Congratulations to everyone involved. 

The finished product: London's most beautiful office space

More on @BizLondon #FortuneMinerals February cover story #LdnOnt

It takes some gumption to start a mining company in your London, Ont. basement and name it Fortune Minerals.

            Presumably, the name refers to the fortune such a company some day would deliver to its employees and shareholders. Or perhaps Robin Goad chose the name because he knew he would need a serious dose of good fortune to make his fledgling venture a success. Either way, Goad created Fortune Minerals in 1988 and took it public the following year, peddling over-the-counter penny stocks and working part-time as a mining consultant to cover some of the costs of his new business.

            In 1996, Fortune discovered deposits of gold, copper, cobalt and bismuth not far from Yellowknife in the NWT. As you can read in this month’s Business London cover story, the company has been working to mine the area ever since. There’s reason to believe it could start extracting minerals by 2016, two decades after making the original find. Mining is not a industry for the impatient.

            In the mid-90s, the copper and gold might have been the headline from the discovery. But since then, the world has changed. Lead is now a four-letter word, drummed out of paint, pipes and water supplies, by law and moral suasion, around the world. And it just so happens bismuth is an ideal substitute for lead in a variety of industrial applications -- without any of the health concerns. Bingo. Fortune’s NWT mine has 12 per cent of the world’s known bismuth reserves.

            How about cobalt? Would you believe it’s a primary ingredient in the ultra-sophisticated lithium-ion and nickel-metal hydride batteries that power so much of the developed world every day? Cordless appliances and tools; smart phones, laptops and tablets; electric cars and so much more.

            Even though a barrel of oil costs about the same as a barrel of monkeys right now, Tesla is going ahead with a $5-billion lithium-ion battery plant in Nevada. It won’t take a Keystone pipeline to get the cobalt – which will be processed at a Fortune facility near Saskatoon – to the Nevada desert facility.

            When Fortune made its original find, no one had heard of Elon Musk and his quixotic Tesla Motors, the company leading the world toward a future of electric cars that people actually want to drive.

            Fortune appears to be well situated. But it’s still waiting to sell its first ounce of bismuth or cobalt to anyone. So last year, it made a huge strategic move and purchased an operating silver mine in Colorado. More than tripling its workforce, it instantly became a producing mine, rather than simply a speculative one. Only trouble is the price of silver, like all commodities, has plummeted in the last four months. Oh, and the mine turned out to be a bit of a fixer-upper. So it hasn’t provided any net revenue as yet. “But it will within the next month or so,” says Goad.

            If it does, and if the bismuth and cobalt start flowing in the next 24 months, the name of Goad’s company might well suit it. If not? Well, the company has another mine site in B.C., where it has rare anthracite coal. But that is going to take even longer to develop.

            And so goes the mining industry. Years of hope and despair, punctuated by stunning success and crushing defeats. Fortune is poised for one of the former. And in mining terms, it could happen any day now.

When reviews start arriving #ldnont #amreading #kindle #thriller

Having published my first novel last month, I can tell you there’s only one thing better than a positive review from someone you know who took the time to read your book: A positive review from someone you don’t know!

            As you may have noticed from my website and various media, social and otherwise, I published Pulling Strings last month. It’s available for all tablets and e-readers and also as a paperback from Amazon.com. As I’ve blurbed many times, it’s a thriller/murder mystery about politics, baseball and sex – not necessarily in that order.

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            The response so far has been very encouraging. I’ve heard from a bunch of people who have enjoyed it and are looking forward to my next book – working title: Tangled Strings. (I know, I have a thing about strings.)

            Selling a book takes as much time and effort as writing it, as I’m learning, and it’s easy to get discouraged when you see your novel listed somewhere around No. 250,000 on the Amazon.com sales ranking. I got up into the 400s on Amazon.ca the first week the book was available, but there are millions of indie books out there, so the challenge is to lead potential readers to your book.

            And that’s where reviews come in. Let’s be honest, if you see something, anything, listed online and 100 people have given it four or five stars, you are more likely to buy it. But let’s be honest, leaving reviews is a chore, and the motivation is greater to review something we hate than something we love.

            So when this review popped up today, it was very encouraging:

5.0 out of 5 stars

AWESOME Read Jan. 9 2015

By Lori Gaudette - Published on Amazon.com

 What an awesome read! I love baseball and knew very little about American Politics - I learned a lot while being highly entertained through the flow of this story. I could not put the book down - from page 1 until the end, I was caught up in a story that showed great characters with personalities and lives intermingling with a surprise ending! Loved the book and hope to read more from this author.

Just like when this one arrived a couple of weeks ago:

5.0 out of 5 stars

When will Christopher Clark release his next thriller? Dec 26 2014

By Mike King

Format:Kindle Edition

Should one read a book on Christmas day? There are many subjects covered with skill and knowledge which kept me at the book until finished, in one sitting. I believe this story has something for everyone and two family members are anxious to get it. Christopher has the correct set of skills to keep any reader anxious to get to the next chapter and hopefully future books with some of the same characters. Can't imagine a much better first book. Well done Mr. Clark.

 

Of course, it’s self-serving to write a blog and quote people who love my book, but guess what? If you want to sell the book you’ve spent a year or more writing, designing and editing, you’ve got to be a little self-serving. So bear with me while I mention one more review that was very encouraging:

5.0 out of 5 stars

Pulling Strings captured my attention from the first pages until ... Dec 20 2014

 By Chris Constantine - Published on Amazon.com

Format:Kindle Edition

Pulling Strings captured my attention from the first pages until its riveting conclusion. For fans of political intrigue, Clark deftly weaves a story of 'curveballs' that had me flipping pages eagerly. Each character overcomes multiple obstacles to ensure a brighter future, whether it be in the high stakes game of American politics or the climb up the proverbial ladder for an up and coming Major League Baseball prospect. Clark offered a glimpse into both worlds that was refreshing for even the most seasoned political or baseball follower. Give this book every opportunity to capture your fascination. For a first time novel writer, Clark will want to pursue this avenue in the future because his future is a bright one.

There you have it, a few reviews of my novel. I’ll close with two points.

You can read the first several chapters of Pulling Strings right here on my website to see if it appeals to you.

And if you read a book, any book, you like, you can be sure the author would love to receive a review, posted wherever you bought the book. 

The year my daughter asked about #Santa #Christmas #LdnOnt

I wrote this a decade ago, the year my daughter started to wonder if Santa was real…

            I suspected the jig was up when she asked flat out: Is there really a tooth fairy?

            Since that day several months ago, I knew this Christmas was going to be different for my daughter Emily and for me.

            It’s a very short trip from pondering the tooth fairy to questioning the Easter bunny to doubting Santa Claus, and this is the year she started that journey.

            As surely as parents delight in the wonder on their children’s faces when Santa fulfils their wishes, we squirm when they start to wonder exactly how he gets to so many houses – and more perplexing, how he gets into them.

            “Who wants to go down a chimney anyway?” Emily asked recently, her mind in full flight as she considered all the obstacles Santa must face on Christmas Eve.

            But doubt as she might, she was not willing to give up completely on the man who had been so faithful on her seven previous Christmas Days.

            “It would be too hard for him to go to every house, so I think maybe there are teams of people who do certain areas,” she surmised. “I still don’t know how they get into the houses though.”

            After a weekend of conversations like this, she finally pleaded: “Tell me, please. I have to know. Is Santa real?”

            I imagine the feeling of that moment will return the day she decides it’s time to buy her first bra, but I’m willing to wait and see.

            Faced with such an emotional plea, I did what any 21st-Century parent would do – I ran out of the room, straight for my computer.

            In less than a minute, I had found Francis Church’s famous editorial, printed in New York in 1897, ‘Yes Virginia, there is a Santa Claus’.

            I dashed upstairs to Emily’s room, where she was sitting, waiting for an answer. The editorial would solve everything, so I began to read aloud.

            With no Santa, “there would be no child-like faith then, no poetry, no romance to make tolerable this existence. We should have no enjoyment, except in the sense and sight. The eternal light with which childhood fills the world would be extinguished.”

            Huh? As my daughter’s eyes rolled to the back of her head, I considered two possibilities.

            Either children in the 1890s were a lot more literate than their counterparts today, or perhaps the editorial was written for adults and not children at all.

            Either way, this wasn’t going to sate Emily’s curiosity or get me off the hook. In the end, I did more listening than explaining. I let her talk herself into a world in which love and kindness produce a kind of magic at Christmastime that no one can fully understand.

            We are all Santa’s helpers, but we never know what the outcome of everyone’s efforts will be.

            I sidestepped the chimney question entirely, and that seemed OK with Emily. She was more than happy to embrace a world in which there are miracles and not everything can be explained.

            And come to think of it, so am I.

I come not to bury #Bell customer service but to praise it #LdnOnt

            Yesterday, when I noticed my Sympatico home Wi-Fi was down, I had the same two thoughts everyone in that situation has: When will it be fixed and how many hours will I spend on the phone Monday fighting with someone to make it happen?

            Like anyone who ever bought a Dell computer – that was a thing, kids, in the 90s – I have less than fond memories of lying on the floor of my office with the speakerphone on, trying to read some 4-point-type serial number to a guy half way around the world who was just getting started on a 35-point checklist to diagnose my problem, the first question on which was: Is your computer plugged in?

Don't ever say this blog isn't rich with images. Here's a picture of a modem. A modem, people.

            So I was far from optimistic when I called Bell this morning to report my frozen modem. My mood brightened somewhat when I waited only 15 seconds for someone to answer my call. Not only that, the person was the right person to help, not a person to find a person who would ask a person if that person could help.

            This person was friendly and within two minutes had diagnosed the issue – a faulty power supply. She could send a new one or I could go to a Bell store and pick one up, right away. She listed the Bell stores nearby with the right plug in stock. I chose the nearest – Masonville Place for those scoring at home – and she contacted them so they’d be expecting me.

            Don’t get me wrong. I was still skeptical. I fully expected to bring home the new plug and still have no Internet service.

            When I got to the Bell store, there was no line. Huh? And the guy behind the counter had my plug ready and waiting. I was out of there in three minutes. No charge. I was still skeptical.

            When I got home I plugged in the modem with the new power supply and waited. Green lights flashed, and flashed, and then, voila! It sprang back to life.

            So I come not to bury Bell customer service but to praise it. A complicated system of people and technology came together this morning to make one customer in London, Ontario very happy.

            Amazing.

Cutting the cell phone contract cord @virginmobilecan #LdnOnt

I’m about to go untethered. Unattached. Uncommitted. Free.

            Call it what you will, but at the end of this month, my cell phone contract ends and I’m not signing another one. I’m a free agent baby.

            So what am I going to do? Well, let me tell you. I’m staying right where I am. That’s correct --  same carrier, same data plan, same service. My monthly bill will drop 10 per cent, but nothing else will change. (Or at least that’s what the fine folks in the Virgin Mobile kiosk assured me recently when I inquired about my options.)

            As it is in the NBA – and I usually turn to the NBA for analogies in my life – it makes more financial sense for my free agent self to stick with my current team than to sign elsewhere. A new team can’t offer me what I’m getting now for the same price. Actually, Virgin won’t either if I sign another traditional contract with them. The only way to keep what I have and not pay about 50 per cent more, is to snip the contract cord and go month-to-month.

            Right now I pay $65/month. For that I get more calling time than I use, unlimited texts, and a sweet 6 gigs of data. If I sign a new contract with Virgin, it will cost about $90/month to get the same stuff. And I don’t want to give up those 6 gigs. I use most of them every month, tethering my Surface tablet to the mighty Virgin/Bell network to get Internet where Wi-Fi is iffy or unavailable. The kids can watch Netflix on a two-hour drive to Toronto using those 6 gigs. I’m not giving them up.

My new Nexus 5 phone from Google. It's white on the back! And it says Nexus!

            We sign contracts to get the new phone we want for a heavily subsidized price. When contracts in Canada were three years, the pricing reflected that time period. We paid off our phones over three years, then usually upgraded our phone and signed another contract. When noted consumer advocate Stephen Harper banned three-year contracts, reducing them to two years, you won’t believe what happened. Cell phone companies had the gall to adjust their pricing, recouping the sunk cost of the phone in the shorter period of time. Who saw that coming?

            When my contract ends, I could very well continue with the phone I’ve had for three years – a Samsung Galaxy Nexus – but what’s the fun in that? Instead, I’ve already purchased a 32 GB, Nexus 5 directly from the Google Play store, where it was $399, much less than anywhere else. In a few weeks, I’ll take it to the Virgin kiosk and make the official switch from old Nexus to new Nexus. Being something of a computer genius – ahem – I’ve already transferred all my pictures, songs and other detritus to my new phone. It’s ready to go.

            Of course, in the time between buying the phone and getting it up and running with Virgin, Google has released the Nexus 6. You might not have heard about that because Apple had nothing to do with it and doesn’t sell it at their stores. But I’m happy with my Nexus 5. The 6 is just too big and too expensive. At least until the next time I get the itch to upgrade. Once I’m untethered, I guess I’ll be able to upgrade any time I want. Oh, that could be dangerous. 

More on @BizLondon Oct. cover story: @london_airport #LdnOnt

            It probably goes without saying that anyone who builds an airplane in his garage and then flies himself and his wife to Northern Ontario for vacation is an optimist.

            So we can stipulate Mike Seabrook is an optimist. The fuel tank is half full, not half empty.

            That optimism helps explain the plan he has to boost passenger traffic at the London International Airport by 50 per cent over the next three years – from 500,000 to 750,000 annually.

            As you can read in this month’s issue of Business London magazine, since the day Seabrook took over as president of Southwestern Ontario’s largest airport in May, 2012, he has focused his energy on growth.

Mike Seabrook built and flies a tandem-seat RV-8 airplane like this one. His is purple and resides in a hangar at the London airport

         He’s determined to capture a significant slice of travelers who live within an hour or two of the airport but routinely drive across the U.S. border to catch flights in Detroit, Flint, Niagara Falls and Buffalo. He’s got the studies to show there are 2.2-million such people – easy to believe if you’re trying to cross the Windsor-Detroit border on a typical weekend and are stuck behind a never-ending line of cars and trucks.

             So ya, travelers would love to make the easy drive to London, park for the bargain sum of $50/week, and make connections to the rest of the world. Of course, it ain’t that easy.

             For starters, airports in Canada have higher cost structures than those in the U.S., so comparable flights from London are more expensive than those across the border. If an airline can fill most of its flights operating from Buffalo or Flint, why would it spend the money to set up shop in London, Ontario?

             It would only do so if Seabrook and his colleagues could demonstrate doing so would be profitable.

             “Airline assets are portable, by their nature,” Seabrook says. “They can deploy their aircraft wherever they can make a profit.”

            It took about seven years for the folks at the London airport to convince United to offer connecting flights to Chicago. That started four years ago, and by all accounts has been a successful venture for United. The Chicago model was one of the factors that prompted United to expand its London flights and begin flying to and from New York later this month.

            The New York flights are a real coup for London, promising to boost passenger numbers in the direction of Seabrook’s goal of 750,000. But they alone won’t get him there. He needs more airlines, more flights, more destinations to lure significantly more travelers.

            The airport needs to reach the next critical mass point, with so many more travelers that airlines want to add flights to gain part of the growing London pie. Airlines are famously volatile; they contract and expand based on dozens of economic and political factors, most of which the London airport cannot control or even influence.

            Seabrook and his team work every day on the things they can control: making the airport a more attractive place for travelers and airlines alike. And they pitch the hell out of their service, doing whatever they can to lure new airlines and new flights to the city.

            If they keep doing that and airlines like United take notice and add new destinations like New York, they just might meet their goal. But it’s a long shot, the kind of goal only an optimist would set.

#JoeSwan 's milquetoast platform #LdnOnt @Munici_politics @Downtown_London

I must admit to being confused. I was under the impression Joe Swan was running for mayor of London, a city of close to 400,000 people with a multi-billion-dollar economy.

            After seeing Swan’s seven-point economic development plan announced yesterday, I’m thinking he must be running for reeve of a small hamlet somewhere else in Southwestern Ontario.

            The plan – as reported by various media but remarkably, not posted on his campaign website the day he announced it – calls for $10-million in spending to stimulate the city’s economy and create jobs.

            If that $10-million figure sounds familiar, you might be thinking of the $10-million Swan loudly opposed giving Fanshawe College to help it renovate the former Kingsmill’s department store. That project will attract 1,600 additional Fanshawe students downtown and generate $150,000 in tax revenue annually for the city.

            It passed last week, over Swan’s politically expedient objections, to the relief of left-wing, tax-and-spend organizations like the Downtown Business Association and the London Economic Development Corp. Not to mention the city’s treasurer and chief planner.

            Licking his wounds from that loss and a London Free Press poll that showed him running fourth in what had been considered a three-man race, Swan summoned local media Friday and unveiled his grand economic development plan, a plan he promised would, “turn economic development on its head.”

            Bring it on Joe, hit us with both barrels. Whatcha got to create jobs in the city and fuel your run to victory on Oct. 27?

            What he’s got is a weak-kneed, milquetoast plan to inject $10-million into the city’s economy. He’s going to turn economic development on its head by spending 1.3 per cent of city hall’s 2014 budget of $776-million. It’s like tipping your waitress $2 after a great dinner with your sweetheart. Or tipping the pizza delivery guy a handful of nickels.

            That ain’t gonna get it done Joe.

Joe pledges to 'turn economic development on its head'                         Photo: Metro News

            Not only is the $10-million figure so small as to have virtually no effect, he has spread it out over a seven-point plan full of trivial, gee-wouldn’t-it-be-great-if proposals.

            A Shop Local London website? Really? That’s going to turn economic development on its head? Have you ever used Google Joe? It kind of takes care of the shop local angle for those looking to do so. If a micro-enterprise can’t figure out how to create a website for $200/year and open a Twitter account, it’s not going to be around long enough to create any jobs.

            Glomming on to the Ivey Business School, Swan allocates another micropayment of $250,000 to create some kind of international think tank in association with the school. “Cultural leaders” will cross-promote business and culture. Huh?

            The big ticket item is $5-million – or 0.65 per cent of the city budget – in start-up capital for businesses ready to grow – shovel-ready, to use a phrase that expired two years ago. The money must be matched by investors and will be managed by the LEDC. That could create some jobs. Ten maybe. Twenty perhaps. Great news in that hamlet where Swan’s apparently running for office. In the London economy, it’s not even enough to cause a ripple in the Thames.

            There’s $1.5-million for “21st Century industries.” Swan cited some examples: fashion design, online writing and app creation. Let’s be generous and assume his examples are the weak part of the proposal and he’s also talking about game developers and web-based design businesses. The thing holding those businesses back is not the lack of a few shekels from the city. The struggle is finding people with the necessary skills to do the work.

            Stand by, Swan has a plan for that problem too. He’s offering $5 per hour for every post-secondary student hired locally. That, he claims arbitrarily, could create 75 jobs. Yes, 75 whole jobs in a city of nearly 400,000. And that presumes employers are going to be swayed by $5/hour/new employee. If they are, it’s not going to be in the 21st Century industries, that’s for sure.

            There’s more to the plan, and if it’s ever posted on Swan’s campaign website there might be more details. But the basics will remain. The candidate who plans to turn economic development on its head has pledged 1.3 per cent of the city hall budget to build websites and set up think tanks.

            Good news Orchestra London. You’ll be getting your executive director back in about six weeks. 

@Downtown_London biz transforms into @Hangar9ByFC, @BizLondon Sept cover

The plan was to get a new logo and maybe splash on a fresh coat of paint.

            Instead, Jo-Ann Fisher and her daughters spent two weeks this summer scrubbing walls, shelves and mannequins. They altered their colour scheme, replaced the floors, cabinets and countertops. They changed the name of their 30-year-old business. And, oh yes, they did get that new logo.

            As you can read about in this month’s Business London magazine cover story, Fisher & Company, the venerable Richmond Row upscale women’s clothier, is now Hangar9. As Fisher prepares for semi-retirement, when she will leave the business to three of her daughters, she has gambled on an new image, all the while offering the same level of service that made the store something special from the moment she opened three decades ago.

             The Fisher women knew all too well how their store was perceived by shoppers. “Old,” Jo-Ann says plainly. “But we weren’t old, never have been,” she says. Still, the new look is designed to quash that perception and attract younger women (and men for the first time) to the store.

            Let’s be honest. By any name, the shop is not inexpensive. It’s popular among professional women who have more money than time and appreciate the service provided by the Fishers and their staff. Customers can book an appointment to go in and put together an entire wardrobe. The ‘9’ in Hangar9 refers to the idea that 9 core items can form the foundation for enough fashion combinations to get someone through a month.

            Shoppers who buy in receive a glossy book of photos, featuring them wearing their own clothes. It’s the last 10 minutes of What Not to Wear. You look through the book and find a combination for the day, relying on your 9 basic pieces and as many accessories as you can fit in your closet.

            While maintaining the personal service angle, Hangar9 also has introduced some fancy lines, including Marie Saint Pierre, the premium line in the store. The MSP rep working with the Fishers is the fourth daughter in the fashion-savvy family. Natch.

            It takes guts to gut a store that’s been a success for 30 years and launch something all new, targeted in part at a new clientele. But it’s a gamble the Fishers have taken on enthusiastically. Their Toronto by-appointment-only shop is being transformed as well. They’re all in on Hangar9 – substantially more than a new logo and a fresh coat of paint.