The term entrepreneur, according to Oxford’s Dictionary, has its roots in the French word “entreprendre” that describes “the director of a musical institution.”
The commonly used English translation defines “a person who sets up a business or businesses, taking on financial risks in the hope of profit.”
Jenny Mitchell fits both definitions. She is the director of a music label called Label Fantastic and she sets up businesses such as the Golden Bus and Gone Guelph, where she takes on financial risks in hope of profit.
How she manages risk and calculates profit veers somewhat from the traditional business model.
“Most of my projects tend to focus around spaces or projects that recognize the significance of the people that support them,” said Mitchell. “It’s like a community currency. It goes beyond money and into this other realm that seems far more sustainable and entirely positive.”
Mitchell was born in Kingston but Guelph has been her home since she was two years old. She lives here with her son Otis, 8, daughter Arrow, 5 and her partner in life and business Scott Haynes.
For more than three years, Haynes and Mitchell have co-hosted Golden Throats Karaoke and regularly share the stage in other musical projects.
“He plays bass in my band Bird City and I occasionally play bass for his projects,” said Mitchell. “He also fixes amplifiers, pedals and guitars. So he keeps all my musical gear operating.”
Mitchell is a member of local groups The Barmitzvah Brothers and Jenny Omnichord and recently worked with producer Scott Merritt on Bird City’s new album The Winnowing, which is set for release on the Label Fantastic label this fall.
Label Fantastic is a collective of independent local bands where they can pool resources and promote each other’s shows and projects.
“To be different from a normal label I have kept money out of the equation,” said Mitchell. “I don’t make money. I don’t take money for anything. It is just a website that I fund myself and post about these guys doing great things.”
She started promoting local bands while working at her father, Ray Mitchell’s, Family Thrift Store.
“We used to host concerts at my dad’s Family Thrift Store,” said Mitchell. “When the store was gone I felt that there was a real lack of venues that that focused on the type of space we were creating for people.”
The closure of the store in 2009 inspired Mitchell to launch, Gone Guelph a collection of t-shirts depicting hand-drawn images of shuttered Guelph businesses. Proceeds from t-shirt sales help to finance projects such as The Golden Bus.
“It is an incubator space for youth bands and emerging projects,” said Mitchell.
“We had 13 concerts on the Golden Bus last year with 24 different performers. We were also part of the Guelph Film Festival, Kazoo Fest and Comedy Festival as a film-screening venue.“
She is taking the bus and a collection of local musicians on the road next week to the Sappyfest music festival in Sackville New Brunswick. The trip is a bit of a working vacation for Mitchell.
“The bus is not how I plan to make my money,” said Mitchell. “I am the volunteer and mobile studio coordinator for CFRU and I’m a part time school bus driver for Denny’s Bus Lines.”
Converting the bus into a mobile art and music venue was a community effort by many local artists and craftspeople that donated their skills and resources.
“I feel there is a lot of community wrapped up in the whole thing and when I look around the bus I see all those contributions from friends and community,” said Mitchell. “I feel like I have built a nice community for the artistic weirdoes and every year I take on a different thing I want to experiment with.”
