Indigenous

Understand who you are first

With 30 years of experience in the industry, Deneen Allen understands the unique challenges of Indigenous, rural and remote tourism development in Canada. She’s deeply committed to making stories of place and culture come alive for guests and their hosts. Lodges, camps, glamping, parks, hotels, food concepts, Indigenous cultural spaces and places – these are just some of the businesses that Deneen has contributed her experience to.

Her extensive industry knowledge in tourism and hospitality design, product development, operations, marketing and finance has been parlayed into her two business ventures: Pure North Canada, a leading tourism and hospitality consultancy, and Firecircle, an innovative digital business accelerator and mentorship platform that has helped dozens of individual tourism entrepreneurs in their business start-up and growth.


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Inspiring Future Leaders

Colby Delorme is one of the founding creators of Influence Mentoring Society, and was appointed Chairperson of the IMS’ Board of Directors in December 2020. With over 26 years of experience in business and as an entrepreneur, Mr. Delorme has built multiple businesses and is currently the President of the Imagination Group of Companies. Mr. Delorme’s experience has spanned the construction industry, brand development and marketing, a certification practice, franchise development, tobacco manufacturing, and business consulting. Mr. Delorme is also a celebrated industry leader; in 2010, he was inducted into the Calgary Top 40 Under 40 and won the Big Idea 2. In 2014, Mr. Delorme was the recipient of the Dr. Douglas Cardinal Award from the University of Calgary. Colby Delorme has a long and varied career in Not-For-Profit and Corporate governance, sitting on many boards over the past 15 years. Mr. Delorme holds an Institute of Corporate Directors Designation from the Rotman School of Management and was recently awarded the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee award in Alberta. Colby is passionate about creating new and sustainable opportunities in business and for Indigenous peoples.


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Tackling unexpected challenges with fearless determination

Nicole Matos is a Metis woman, wife, mother of three, President of Rivet Construction and Founder of Oonnie Food Technologies. Leading her construction company for over a decade and now founding a food tech company, Nicole loves to tackle unexpected challenges with fearless determination. You will often hear Nicole say that her successes have mostly come from trying everything the wrong way first.

As an indigenous business Rivet is open to talking about potential partnerships or joint ventures. Rivet currently operates mostly in Alberta, however has a satellite office in Kelowna and some presence in SK. Rivet’s focus is commercial construction, commercial preventative maintenance and design build.

Oonnie is Farmers Market online – it gives you an opportunity to sell your products all day everyday without ever having to set up a physical booth or stand in the rain. Oonnie is like Etsy for food. Oonnie provides a platform and tools to support and help food producers grow their business.


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Canada‘s rich and diverse Indigenous economy is on the rise

Nicole McLaren is a multi-award-winning Métis entrepreneur from British Columbia and Saskatchewan. Her extensive knowledge of industry supply chains and economic development coupled with a passion for supporting fellow Indigenous entrepreneurs allowed her to transform a small book club into Raven Reads, the world’s first Indigenous subscription box.

Through her hard work and ambition, Raven Reads has grown exponentially, with thousands of subscribers across Canada, the US, and Europe. Once a sole proprietor, curating and packaging boxes in her garage, Nicole now manages an elite team and operations out of their Kamloops warehouse and distribution centre.

Nicole is the recipient of Startup Canada’s National Indigenous Business of the Year (2018) and the BC Achievement Foundation’s Indigenous Business of the Year (2020). She was also a finalist in the Small Business BC’s Premier’s People’s Award (2021) and the Greater Vancouver Board of Trade’s Business Resilience Regional Export Plan of the Year (2020).

Through the incredible success of Raven Reads, Nicole has invested over $250,000 back into the Indigenous economy, and donated over $2,000 to literacy programs for Indigenous children and youth. She is the Founder and Chair of the Indigenous Women’s Business Network, an organization that she created to provide coaching and mentoring to other Indigenous women business owners.

Nicole holds two bachelor’s degrees from the University of Saskatchewan, and will complete her Masters of Business Administration in 2023 from the University of Illinois’ Gies School of Business. She currently resides in Logan Lake, BC with her husband and two young children.


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Activism comes in many forms with Dr. Robyn Bourgeois

Dr. Robyn Bourgeois (Laughing Otter Caring Woman) is a mixed-race nêhiyaw iskwew whose Cree family comes from Treaty 8 territory (Lesser Slave Lake). She is an associate professor in the Centre for Women’s and Gender studies at Brock University, but is currently serving as the university’s acting Vice-Provost, Indigenous Engagement. As a survivor of multiple forms of violence, Dr. Bourgeois’ research examines violence against Indigenous women and girls, but also Indigenous women’s anti-violence leadership. In addition to speaking and publishing nationally and internationally, Dr. Bourgeois testified as an experiential and expert witness at the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls in October 2018. Along with being an academic, Robyn is an activist, artist, and proud mom to three kids.

Learn about the Niagara Leadership Summit for Women at www.niagaralsw.ca


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Indigenous-owned ethical, sustainable and natural hair care products from Edmonton

Vanessa Marshall was born and raised in a small town in northern Alberta. She has two kids and a loving husband. She grew up in a sustainably oriented family and taking care of the earth and its animals has always been a passion of hers. She leads a plant-based lifestyle and does her best to reduce her carbon footprint whenever possible. She is passionate about her family and business and loves to spread kindness. Jack59 is an Indigenous-owned and operated company located in Edmonton Alberta, Canada. They believe in the highest quality ingredients, locally sourced whenever possible. Their passion lies in creating amazing hair products and their mission is to provide amazing hair days while reducing people’s carbon footprints.


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Indigenous entrepreneurs receive $25 million boost from world’s first Indigenous Impact Fund

The Raven Indigenous Impact Fund provides equity and equity-like capital to innovative, scalable, purpose-driven Indigenous enterprises. The Fund looks to support entrepreneurs who are at the seed and/or early stage. Through the Raven Fund, innovative Indigenous enterprises can access the support they need to grow from a trusted partner. The Fund represents a sustainable, values-driven approach to poverty reduction and community resilience that will directly contribute to the development of an Indigenous middle class. Enterprises are screened through a unique, Indigenous impact lens and receive investments ranging from $250,000 to $2 million. This is an interview about the reason and availability of this fund for Indigenous Entrepreneurs.

Paul Lacerte, Managing Partner. Paul Lacerte has provided innovative leadership to Indigenous organizations throughout his career. He is the former Vice-Chair of the Vancouver Foundation Board of Directors, the former Board Chair for Reconciliation Canada, and a former representative to the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues. He was awarded the Order of BC in 2014.

Jeffrey Cyr, Managing Partner. Jeff is Métis from the White Horse Plains area of Southern Manitoba, the traditional Buffalo Hunt staging grounds. For nearly 20 years, he has provided strategic leadership for Indigenous, not-for-profit, and government organizations. Jeff has helped create and implement the community-driven outcomes contract (a unique pay-for-success social finance model) and the Indigenous Solutions Lab process, which earned him an Ashoka Fellowship. Jeff is a proud husband and father of five and currently lives and works on unceded Algonquin lands in what is now known as Ottawa, Ontario.


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Alicia Dubois is CEO of the Alberta Indigenous Opportunities Corporation, Which Guarantees Loans for Indigenous Groups in Alberta

Alicia Dubois is the first-ever CEO of the Alberta Indigenous Opportunities Corporation, which was created to in November 2019 to guarantee loans for Indigenous groups to facilitate investment in natural resource projects and related infrastructure.

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