When I first started out as an entrepreneur here in Canada in 2004, I worked on a number of projects, including a re-marketing an endangered animal sanctuary, helping a private school find a new location in North Vancouver as well as working with Compassion Canada. Our goal there was to try and raise $250,000 to support orphans and families again in Uganda. We did this via a Guinness World Record attempt for the World’s Largest Ball of Tape, which at the time was 230 pounds. A year later, we came in at 1860 pounds and managed to raise $275,000!
We celebrated the record with a grand finale at a big cinema complex, complete with a carnival and fireworks show. A chap named Rod Cameron donated those fireworks. That was 2006, and ever since then, he and I have been connected and friends.
Recently, he approached me at We Make Stuff Happen to ask if we could help with a new Digital Adoption Strategy. Since then, we’ve also been working together on some new grandiose ideas, one of which is his own fireworks manufacturing and distribution Company in the United States that brings in its fireworks from their own factory in Cambodia.
He invited me to visit the factory. When you’re working with a client and rebuilding their website, context is everything. We do all we can to see pictures and hear stories, there is nothing like seeing it for yourself. So recently, I flew to Cambodia and was graciously met by Rod, his wife Wendy, and their team in Phnom Penh.
We drove about an hour to the firework factory, and I stayed there for two days, learning the whole process of firework manufacture from the pulp paper that they put together that wraps the core of the firework right through to the lift-powder construction. I learned how fireworks are made safely and put together by hand and packaged up and shipped back to clients in North America, Mexico, Brazil, the United Kingdom, and all over the world. I get so much joy in working with my clients, who become friends, along with the incredible experience of meeting over 400 Khmae and Chinese people who have come to bring their expertise together in one of the world’s largest firework manufacturing companies.
As a valued client of ours now, we are story-boarding their offering in such a way that their website works for them as a sales tool, 24/7.
That’s why I created WMSH: to work with the most incredible global-thinking, big-picture entrepreneurs.
Rod said to me that, nobody thought you could build a manufacturing company for fireworks outside of China because that’s where it’s been made for generations. But he has! Ten years into its development and continuing to grow. Now we’re part of that process of telling that story and bringing it to the digital space.
So, wow, talk about international! I just had to call this blog Flights, Camera, Action!
It was such an experience, such a joy. This is the kind of work we love to do. Context is everything, especially in a world of AI, where people think they can ask Gemini or Chat GPT to write the content, and believe me, you can. And believe me, it does not work. It has to be unique. It has to be personal, and it has to be authentic. Yes, you can use AI to do some of the hard work, but without real video, real story, real pictures, and real authentic content, you are just white noise. And that’s where we can come in. We break you away from the noise. We create a strategy that works and takes our clients to places that they dream about. And we make those dreams a reality.
In fact, would you believe in 2004, my tagline was “putting wheels on dreams” So maybe in Rod’s case – this could be a “Catherine Wheel” on dreams? Stand by for the launch of another incredible WMSH website and digital strategy!
Pull up a chair and have a virtual coffee with Jonathan!
Follow up on a current project, talk about a new digital marketing idea, or just get some good ole’ fashioned business advice.
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