An Entrepreneurial Spirit
Gordon Stevens returned to Nova Scotia with a vision and entrepreneurial spirit that has blossomed and confirmed for him that this is where he’s supposed to be.
Stevens, 36, and his wife Trina operate a chain of successful coffee shops, a mouth-watering ice cream and candy emporium and a history-rich and tourist-friendly cake factory. Most recently they’ve introduced a children’s store into the mix. They’ve done all of this in Halifax, Nova Scotia and Stevens says they aren’t finished expanding just yet.
“Every Christmas season we try to figure out what we’re going to do next year,” says Stevens. “This year we’re adding two stores and we only thought we were going to add one. So next year, who knows? But I’m starting to think bigger. I used to think that five or six stores was enough but now that we’ve met that, I’m quite happy to say 15.”
The growing catalog of businesses is even more impressive when you consider Stevens’ first foray, the Uncommon Grounds Coffee House on South Park, opened just four years ago in January 2004. Clearly he has found the business climate in Halifax fruitful.
“I think what makes Nova Scotia special is really the fact that it is a small community with a big city feel,” says Stevens. “People are really eager to embrace new things on the customer side and it makes for a very rewarding experience that way.”
Stevens, who has a degree in commerce and both CA (chartered accounted) and CFA (chartered financial analyst) designations, left Nova Scotia in 1996 looking, he says, “to explore new things, learn new things and we thought we could maybe jump-start things by moving away.” Over the next six years the couple worked first in the Cayman Islands and then in New York City honing their finance-industry skills. Also while they were living in the United States, Olivia, the first of their three children, was born.
During their time away, wherever they were the couple scoped out businesses, looking for ideas and inspiration. “We did take the time to look at a lot of different retail stores while we were away. Even though I wasn’t working in retail I knew that’s where my heart lay.”
The Stevens’ decided to return to Nova Scotia in 2002, when daughter Olivia was still an infant.
“Once we had kids, we started to think about moving back in the near term versus the long term. New Jersey (where the couple’s were living) didn’t feel like home –there was none of the network of friends and family that we have in Nova Scotia and once you have kids that becomes a lot more important.”
Their hopes for their return have been amply realized. “The lifestyle in Halifax is something that we really didn’t find anywhere else,” Stevens says. “Our friends are here, our family is here, we’re not spending half-an-hour driving from one part of town to the next. There’s a real sense of community. It’s just a fabulous place to live.”
The Stevens' had been back in Nova Scotia about a year when they felt ready to start planning their first enterprise. Today Halifax boasts four Uncommon Ground cafes, including a seasonal operation that recently opened in the city’s Public Gardens. While the coffee business has worked out for them, the couple was convinced it made sense to establish more than one business – a kind of not-putting-all-your-eggs-in-one-basket approach.
“Having lived in the Caribbean for four years, we wanted something for tourists,” says Stevens. “We asked ourselves what experience can we deliver that will transport them to a different time, a different place.” The answer they came up with was rum cake and a business called Rum Runners Rum Cake Factory, a Prohibition-era styled store on Bishop’s Landing they started setting up just three weeks after Uncommon Grounds opened its doors.
"We’re selling the history of rum-running, as much as the cake itself,” explains Stevens. “At the end of the day, a cake no matter how good it is, is a cake. That’s why the packaging, the story had to be right, to the point that the cake was secondary.”
Next came Sugah! Confectionary and Ice Cream Emporium, a sweet tooth’s dream parlor located next to Rum Runners, where you can buy the Stevens General Store brand of Nova Scotia-made products. Sugah! now also has a Public Garden branch, as part of the Uncommon Grounds outlet. The most recent venture is Uncommon Kids Gear, a store aimed at the young urban family. All Stevens’ businesses embody his devotion to exploring what works best for the city, the area and its people.
“I’m a big fan of growing a business from the ground up and making it feel like it’s from the place and not to bring in a franchise from somewhere else. That may make it an easier business to start but it really doesn’t do anything unique for the area and I think at the end of the day isn’t going to be as fulfilling for the person that’s doing it. The reality is that Nova Scotia has a great history and we have lots of things that really haven’t been capitalized on yet. But when someone has the creative mind and the ideas to make a business out of it I think the world’s our oyster at this point.”
