BCBusiness

29 B C B U S I N E S S . C A N O V E M B E R / D E C E M B E R 2 0 24 A d a m B l a s b e r g T H E K I C K O F F : Raminder Grewal has been working at Keystone Environmental for longer than some of his fellow team members have been alive. Two years after studying environmental engineering at UBC, Grewal joined the Burnaby-based environmental consultancy, which oversees projects that run the gamut from contaminated sites to indoor air quality service. "It's a very technical area," he says, "but the easiest way to put it is that we help our clients when they have a contaminated property and we try to remediate the property." A C T I O N P L A N : Keystone was founded in 1988, but has grown from some 30 employees when Grewal joined the firm in 2000 to around 145 today. It's also diversified its portfolio to add the public sector and has opened offices in both Ontario and Victoria. That has made Keystone one of the largest privately held environ- mental consultancy firms in B.C. While the company has seen massive growth under his steward- ship as president, Grewal gives the credit to his staff. "We put the right people in the right positions and stay out of their way," he says. "It all boils F I N A L I S T Raminder Grewal P R E S I D E N T , K E Y S T O N E E N V I R O N M E N T A L down to our technical expertise; hav- ing people understand our clients' business objectives and where we fit in for the environmental field plays a big role. Our other support positions—IT, accounting—help us understand how we move forward, how we make things seamless. It's a collaboration." The projects Keystone has worked on are confidential, but Grewal can say that a key to the company's success is that it adapts its methodology to suit the client. "The environmental process may be similar, but understanding how [each client] operates, what their business objectives are and how the envi- ronmental process and approvals overlay there—we're really trying to understand where [the clients] are coming from," he says. C L O S I N G S T A T E M E N T: As an environmental consultancy, Keystone invests a lot into considering its own footprint. The company signed a commitment to become net-zero by 2050. "We're in the process of understanding our current carbon footprint and then we will figure out a path to become carbon neutral," says Grewal.–D.W. n T H E K I C K O F F : Carole Herder had a successful children's fashion busi- ness before she followed her true passion: horses. She left Vancouver in 1993 and moved to Roberts Creek, where she took up horse riding. When her first horse died at only 12 years old, she set out to make things better. In particular, she thought something needed to be done about the age-old practice of protecting horses' hooves by nailing metal into them. In 2004, she incorporated Cavallo Horse & Rider and began developing a hoof boot that provided safety and traction and was easy to put on and take off. She took her product to some farriers (people who specialize in hoof care), thinking they would marvel at what she'd done. "I was ridiculed and ostracized," she recalls. "I almost went back to Roberts Creek with my tail between my legs. But it made me more committed." A C T I O N P L A N : Retailers didn't want to stock an unproven product, so Herder took her show on the road. "I went to the horse shows—I drove around and stood in parking lots with moulds of the product in my hand and explained to people that the nailing of metal shoes was creating all kinds of problems for horses' feet," she says. "And they understood, because their horses had suffered these issues and they felt hopeless about what to do." One by one, riders started buying into Herder's innovation. "Recre- ational trail riders, they love their horses, they're part of their families," she says. "When they tried it and discovered it worked, they talked to their friends and it just started spreading." C L O S I N G S T A T E M E N T: Cavallo has eight employees and distribution centres all over the world, and is, in Herder's words, "number one in the industry." The company just signed a deal with Continental AG, the Hanover-based automotive manufacturing giant, to put sensors in the bottom of its boots that can diagnose and predict lameness.–N.C. n F I N A L I S T Carole Herder F O U N D E R A N D P R E S I D E N T , C A V A L L O H O R S E & R I D E R DO Y OU H AV E A N Y E MB A R R A S S ING OB S E S S ION S ? I love to sing karaoke, but I'm not a very good singer. My go-to song is "Desperado." Q+A W H AT ' S A N ODD JOB Y OU ' V E H A D ? I worked at Domino's Pizza and made some really good friends. I was very fast at making pizzas. Q+A

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