The bass thump of a dance tune pounds through La Socit, a cafe or restaurant of Toronto nightclub king Charles Khabouth, who inside a flourish of kitsch has recreated a 1800s Paris bistro, filled with stained glass ceiling, dark wood, white tile floors and art nouveau dcor, in a 1960s poured concrete building.
Two women confer in a corner booth. Younger is Holly Fennell, a naturopathic doctor having a thriving practice in the tony confines of Toronto’s old-money enclave, Rosedale. Beside her sits Beverley Hammond, a longtime marketing guru. Both sparkle in white. Another woman arrives, a blonde dressed in black whom Canadians know well: Belinda Stronach.
I have a lot energy after taking this stuff
In the very first decade of the century, Stronach, scion of auto parts magnate Frank Stronach, was everywhere: She served as chief executive of Magna International, then as a politician. Initially a Conservative member of parliament, Stronach famously crossed the ground to the Liberals ten years ago and have become, for a year, Canada’s minister of recruiting. She made the society pages, too: Along with her two marriages, she has dated Tie Domi, the hockey player, and Peter McKay, the previous Conservative defence minister. (They split up over the floor-crossing incident.)
Of late Stronach has stayed from the news. It’s not that she’s been idle. Her family members have no role or stake in Magna anymore (her ex-husband, Donald Walker, has become Magna’s CEO); she works as chairman and president from the Stronach Group, a private family business which employs over 5,000 people at its six horse race tracks in California, Florida, Maryland and Oregon.
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Separately she’s partnered inside a Toronto private equity finance firm, Acasta Capital, with Mark Entwistle, an old ambassador to Cuba, and Anthony Melman, late of Onex Corp. She shares her time between her home in Toronto’s Annex neighbourhood, her farm in Aurora, and offices in Florida and California.
A startup company has taken Stronach in to the limelight again, an enterprise symbolized by a fountain burbling around the bar here, a kind of elixir of youth filled with a slightly greenish liquid that Stronach, and the two other women here, credit for their glowing skin, thick hair and powerful fingernails. They call it Age Quencher.
“On the very, like, superficial level, you realize, I’ll be that girl for any minute,” says Stronach, flicking back her hair with a toss of her head. “My hair grows” – here she snaps her fingers – “like 10 times faster when I go, like I’m not kidding, I get out of the hairdresser and they’re like you’re hair grows so quick. Well, I’m taking this protein powder!”
When a reporter notes this could add up, when it comes to trips towards the hair salon, Stronach, who turns 50 this season, adds: “I love it! If you’re a chick, that’s a great problem to have. It’s great. I’m serious! Ha ha! Hair and nails? Without a doubt!”
As for her marital status, she says, “I’m totally single. Place it out there.”
For jan, the trio has given 30 women they call “influencers” an effort of Age Quencher, a trio of products that include a supplements, an electrolyte mixture and a whey protein. Tonight those women are talking of their produces a crowd which includes Victoria Radford, the beauty expert, and socialite Ainsley Kerr.
Health Canada has certified the products, formulated, tested and manufactured in Canada, as Natural Health Products. That designation doesn’t suggest that they work, exactly that they won’t do any harm. A month’s supply retails for $200.
As for that benefits: “We haven’t done a study, it’s more anecdotal to this point,” says Adam Cooper, chief executive old Quencher. “My spouse has used it for three weeks, and also the skin on her feet is smoother.”
Fennell pioneered these items whenever a patient, whom cancer treatment had pushed into premature menopause, asked for something to keep her youth.
Stronach, someone of Fennell’s for close to ten years, is also a cancer survivor; in 2007, Stronach underwent a mastectomy to conquer cancer of the breast. Stronach and other patients in Fennell’s clinic soon all started to consume Fennell’s “ingestible beauty items.”
Stronach sees in Fennell an entrepreneur in the vein from the Stronach family.
“I had been always an admirer of Holly’s enthusiasm in order to obtain products,” says Stronach. “She’s endless ideas, for items that can be created to address certain illnesses or symptoms, or perhaps things to enhance one’s well being and vitality.”
Fennell recalls, “Belinda and that i were in her own kitchen one afternoon, both of us feeling really healthy and well, and that we both took the product, so she said, ‘Guess what happens, I’d love to expose you to Bev and really see what we can do about making this product open to other women.’ ”
Hammond was skeptical.
“I was never a vitamin person, and that i had not been to a naturopath,” says Hammond. “Belinda is really a strong advocate for wellness and good eating, and I’m a McDonald’s fan, so we’re a bit on the opposite side from the spectrum.
“And so i did lots of investigation determined that in fact in Asia, in Japan, it’s very prevalant. In Columbia, which is the skincare capital around the globe, it’s quite prominent. Ingestible skincare products is a new group of beauty product.”
Stronach promises more naturopathic products to come. “I have a lot energy after using this stuff,” she says.
Meanwhile, the race tracks will keep her busy. “The Stronach Group is going to be making the largest capital investments out of any racing company inside the industry because it must modernize,” she says.
Oddly, the household famous for car parts and horses will even launch a really different conveyence in March: a new electric bike, designed and built-in Canada, known as the Elby, which can run 140 kilometres between charges, and will retail for near to $4,000. “It’s the best thing, and it’s super fun to ride,” says Stronach, who herself shows no signs of reducing.
“I love manufacturing, you know,” she says. “I grew up in that.”
Financial Post
pkuitenbrouwer@nationalpost.com
Twitter.com/pkuitenbrouwer
