GORP energy bar creator shares recipe for success
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Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 18/11/2016 (3425 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.
A Manitoba entrepreneur who has made fans of her protein energy bar across the world said realizing why her business exists helps her get out of bed each morning.
Speaking to Brandon’s business community, Colleen Dyck, who owns GORP Clean Energy Bars, has clung to her ‘why’ — inspiring people to go on adventures — as the purpose behind her business. It guides every decision she makes, she said.
“My whole mission for this company was to get people to go outside,” Dyck told a packed hall of business leaders yesterday as part of the Brandon Chamber of Commerce’s monthly luncheon series.
This aim informed her belief people do not buy products and services, they purchase items for what they represent.
In demonstrating her conviction for healthy-living, Dyck took seven years to perfect her recipe and ensure it does not have any preservatives. The first GORP bar was finally sold in 2012.
Since then, members of the Winnipeg Jets and Winnipeg Blue Bombers have snacked on her energy bars. And her devoted customers even share pictures of themselves eating GORP bars, whether they are out for a walk, climbing a mountain or watching beluga whales off the coast. They sometimes knock on retailers’ doors, without Dyck’s asking, to ensure GORP bars are on more shelves.
Dyck referenced a picture a grandmother sent of her young grandson taking a GORP bar instead of her fresh baking.
“This is what I’m doing this for,” Dyck said of her customers’ support.
The married mother of four, who started her growing energy bar business out of her family farm in Niverville which is south of Winnipeg, explained the best way to appear authentic as a business is to be authentic.
When a branding company recommended a contest encouraging customers to eat as many GORPs as they could, Dyck explained she rejected the agency’s idea.
She encourages healthy, portioned meals — and only one GORP bar at a time.
“My son ate three — good things did not happen,” Dyck told the luncheon crowd to laughter. “There’s a lot of fibre in those bars.”
GORP bars weren’t the only healthy option on the menu, either.
The event’s sponsor, Assiniboine Community College, supplied sweet potatoes for the lunch, which were grown on the college’s North Hill campus.
Faculty researcher and instructor Sajjad Rao, along with students in the horticulture production and sustainable food systems program, are in the midst of a multi-year research project to find a strain of sweet potato able to survive Manitoba’s growing season.
» ifroese@brandonsun.com
» Twitter: @ianfroese