BioSteel

Mm-hmm.

And, uh, another season of Maple Leafs hockey, if you follow along with us here at Sticks and the Six on the Hockey Podcast Network, brought to you by DraftKings, SeatGeek, and BioSteel.

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He started his career at Unilever, then spent nearly a decade at Crocs in Canada, rising to managing director and launching Crocs Golf as the brand evolved from a niche clog into a global icon.

He then became president of BioSteel, the Canadian sports nutrition brand built on athlete credibility, taking on category giants on shelf.

Today, he's a president and CRO of Warroad Hockey Co, and also spends time advising and investing in growing businesses.

We're talking about what separates brands that break through at retail from those that don't, how to win over buyers, how to build demand that pulls a product off the shelf, and what changes when a brand crosses borders.

Then ultimately pivoted towards doing footwear, where I worked with the emerging brand Crocs in Canada.

Over the course of that 10-year span, had to have a, a great opportunity for lots of different business activities, from the Canadian business to the global golf shoe business, being a member of the offshore captains in Bermuda on behalf of Crocs.

Ultimately, at the end of that 10-year run, I returned to a Canadian organization, BioSteel, where my task there was to grow that business in a scalable manner so that we could sell it.

In 2019, we did sell it, and then since then I've been involved in a variety of different ventures, and most recently Warroad, where we sort of work on protecting the hockey athlete from cuts.

A coffee, a shake, and us- well, no, I guess there's four 'cause then I always have, like, a bubbly water.

Um, but then I also have, like, a, a BioSteel or some sort of isotonic, um, drink that I'm drinking as well, so yeah.

I bring lots of stuff up.

Do you not drop them in the car park? Like, how are you getting four drinks into a building?

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From all of us at the show, thanks for tuning in.

For Tristan and Ant, I'm Brett saying so long.

So we'll leave it there and hope you guys enjoy the episode.

Hello and welcome to the collaboration between the Coaches site and BioSteel, Building the Blueprint for a Successful Youth Hockey Program.

My name is Matt Dumichel.

I'll be the moderator for the conversation today.

So if you do have a question, that you want to ask one of our panelists or you want to go a little bit deeper into the topic please use the chat function in the webinar to submit those questions we'll include some of those in the conversation as well and also of note to make sure that you're not racing through pens and papers there is going to be a recording that will be available starting next week on the coaches site to premium members if

you want to review and re-watch this conversation

Eric, we'll start with you because with BioSteel and the growth that we've seen within the program only in a short period of time, one of the things that with multiple clubs and multiple teams that we talk a lot about is alignment.

So let's start off with that.

You had a

BioSteel and a Red Bull.

Yeah, we played at 8 a.m. sharp, so a Red Bull was in the system before the game, and a bio-stew was drank on the way to...

No, I can't eat before games.

Thank you.

The director of hockey operations at BioSteel Sports Academy and head coach of the U18 AAA program there in Windsor.

The former youth sports varsity hockey player with the University of Windsor Lancers and an honors electrical engineering graduate, Eric transitioned into coaching and player development early in his career with a specialization in strength and conditioning, nutrition, and long-term athlete development.

He previously served as operations manager for Powertech Hockey Development Group, helping lead high-performance training initiatives while building Powertech Development Podcast into a well-known hockey education platform.

Today, he oversees operations and development programming at BioSteel Sports Academy and hosts the Built from Steel podcast, focused on educating players, parents, and coaches on development, performance, and pathways through the game.

Andy Paquette is a longtime head coach, player development specialist, and head coach of the U16 AAA program at BioSteel Sports Academy.

As a player, he competed in the OHL and represented Canada at the U17 level before moving into a career in skill development, coaching and working with players around the world across youth, junior, professional and international hockey.

He founded Powertech Hockey Development, where he spent more than two decades focused on skill development athletic athlete performance and player education including extensive work with players and coaches across the nhl chl ncaa and youth hockey levels andy's coaching philosophy and centers around developing transferable skills hockey sense and deeper understanding of how the game is played he now brings that perspective to the built from steel podcast where he and eric discuss player development coaching scouting and navigating the hockey pathway So that was kind of a long introduction, but the reason for it folks is I wanted you guys to understand that these two guys kind of know what they're talking about and that's why I'm bringing them on to talk to you today.