About Tad Hargrave

Short Professional Bio:

Tad Hargrave is a hippy who developed a knack for marketing (and then learned to be a hippy again). 

He spent his late teens being schooled in a mixed bag of approaches to sales and marketing – some manipulative and some not. When that career ended, he spent a decade unlearning and unpacking what he’d been through.

How had he been swept up in it? Why didn’t those approaches work as well as advertised? Were there ways of marketing that both worked better and felt better to all involved?  It took him time but he began to find a better way to market.

By 2006, he had become one of the first, full-time ‘conscious business’ marketing coaches (for hippies) and created a business where he could share the understanding he had come to: Marketing could feel good. You didn’t have to choose between marketing that worked (but felt awful) or marketing that felt good (but got you no clients).

Since 2001, he has been touring his marketing workshops around Canada, the United States, Europe, and online, bringing refreshing and unorthodox ideas to conscious entrepreneurs and green businesses that help them grow their organizations and businesses (without selling their souls). Instead of charging outrageous amounts, he started doing most of his events on a pay what you can basis. He is the author of sixteen books and workbooks on marketing.

Tad currently lives in Edmonton, Alberta (traditionally known, in the local indigenous language of the Cree, as Amiskwaciy (Beaver Hill) and later Amiskwaciwaskihegan (Beaver Hill House)) and his ancestors come primarily from Scotland with some from the Ukraine as well. He is now dedicated to spending the rest of his days preserving and fostering a more deeply respectful, beautiful and human culture.

“Tad is to Marketing what Steve Jobs was to Apple.”

My first impression of Tad was “What a clean cut savvy Canadian!”  When I finally checked his stuff out, I was beyond impressed.  It made me relax and be ‘me’ around marketing.  His guidance for me is: relax, be authentic and trust.  There’s so much that I’ve applied from him, I would not know how to start. 

Other than that I have a very different vision of marketing these days.  It’s transparent, authentic and feels true and real.  Tad is to Marketing what Steve Jobs was to Apple!  We all need Tad in our pockets!”

Phil Cartwright,  whereisyourheart.net

Long Professional Bio:

Tad Hargrave is a hippy who developed a knack for marketing (and then learned to be a hippy again).

He spent his late teens being schooled in a mixed bag of approaches to sales and marketing – some manipulative and some not.

He learned these approaches while working for a leadership development company mostly from Zig Ziglar, Tom Hopkins, Tony Robbins and Brian Tracey cassettes. He delved into NLP as well and used it all when doing cold calls to sell the seminars they led. He would arrive early in the morning and be the last to leave at night. He worked so hard and dedicated himself to mastering the content. But, in the end, they didn’t work. The results were so small for all the work he put in.

Secretly, he had to admit that these approaches felt awful to do but… what other options were there? Ah. And this led to all rationalizations like  “People are indecisive so you have to help them decide,” and “They’ll thank you if you push them to buy.”

Those early marketing days left him with an allergy to these kinds of approaches and business in general. And years of deep shame at how he’d been with people. It left him feeling fake, even in personal relationships as it spilled over.

When that career ended, he spent a decade unlearning and unpacking what he’d been through. How had he been swept up in it? Why didn’t those approaches work as well as advertised? Were there ways of marketing that both worked better and felt better to all involved?

It took him time but he began to find a better way to market.

In that in-between learning time, he saw so many of his hippy friends struggle to promote their good businesses and projects. These quiet conversations at the bar revealed that they couldn’t seem to get enough clients no matter how hard they tried. They had cutting edge, inspiring and radical businesses. They were good at what they did but not in articulating or marketing what they did. And, even if they wanted to learn how to be a better marketer, they couldn’t because they were often on the most shoestring of budgets and many of the marketing workshops cost a small fortune to attend. They were not accessible to the people who needed them the most. But these were the businesses the world needed most. More examples of people thriving while doing something they loved (that also made a positive difference in the world) were needed not less. 

This had Tad revisit the material he’d learned and try to separate the wheat from the chaff to have something useful to offer to these people. And he discovered, to his surprise, a strange interest in it and skill in it. 

Even more strangely, despite years of hanging out with the anarchist crowd and protesting the IMF, World Bank and WTO, coming to understand the rotten core of capitalism and, even more deeply, Western Civilization, he found a budding appreciation and love for marketing and came to see that there were compelling reasons to get better at marketing that had nothing to do with making more money (though it was useful for that too).

Within a few years, he had become a full-time marketing coach for hippies and created a business where he could share the understanding he had come to: Marketing could feel good. You didn’t have to choose between marketing that worked (but felt awful) or marketing that felt good (but got you no clients). 

So, since 2001, he has been touring his marketing workshops around Canada, the United States, Europe, and online, bringing refreshing and unorthodox ideas to conscious entrepreneurs and green businesses that help them grow their organizations and businesses (without selling their souls). Instead of charging outrageous amounts, he started doing most of his events on a pay what you can basis–where people came to the whole workshop and then paid him whatever they wanted to pay at the end. 

He is the author of sixteen books and workbooks on marketing.

Tad currently lives in Edmonton, Alberta (traditionally known, in the local indigenous language of the Cree, as Amiskwaciy (Beaver Hill) and later Amiskwaciwaskihegan (Beaver Hill House)) and his ancestors come primarily from Scotland with some from the Ukraine as well.

He is now dedicated to spending the rest of his days preserving and fostering a more deeply respectful and human culture.

“After working with Tad, I feel more relaxed and also more energized.”

My first impression of Tad’s business was: fun name. Looks good. Knows what he’s talking about.  At first I had a Puttering Session, and then I joined his membership because there was nothing in the way.  I was curious and inspired and felt at home.  From the beginning I was impressed with Tad and his work.  He has created a lot of excellent material and a supportive community. 

The thing that’s stayed with me the most is Tad’s POV framework.  I hadn’t seen it anywhere else.  I learned how to apply it more systematically when I work with clients, which has helped me build my own community and grow the number of enthusiastic clients.  Tad also provides a lot of encouragement along the way. 

After working with Tad, I feel more relaxed and also more energized.  I don’t like the vibe of most marketing people. Many feel inauthentic, too polished, too money-centric.  I found that I always did things differently, so I’m happy to have found a colleague and role model in Tad.

Ingrid Lill, lillbranding.com

More About Tad (Updated Summer of 2021):

I seem to have spent much of my adult life building community around positive change and creating events for people to come together to make good things happen.

Maybe my passion for building community came from my schooling when I was younger. I grew up in Edmonton going to an alternative hippy school called Waldorf. In kindergarten we would sit carting wool, then spinning it and then knitting our own recorder cases. I was, possibly, the only child at my school who never really learned how to play.

We learned Greek, Roman and Norse myths in elementary school, having Homer’s Osyssey told to us by the teacher from the front of the room. We would bake our own bread in class, play capture the flag in Mill Creek ravine and somehow consistently persuade our french teacher to let us play soccer during french class (“Okay! But you guys need to speak in french while we play!”).

My best memories are the Summer Solstice bonfires at Hawrelack Park where are the families and children would get together for a big end of the year picnic and celebrate. Then, when it was dark, we would gather around the fire for stories. So many happy memories from those times. The school, to my immense heartbreak, collapsed when I was in grade 6 due to politics I have never fully understood.

I went to public school in junior high and then to Victoria School for the Performing Arts (then Vic Comp). It was a wonderful, open and creative environment and I was blessed with incredible teachers across the board.

To the utter dismay of many of my teachers, I never went to university after high school.

In 1999, I toured with the Whole Life Expo (the largest New Age Consumer Expo in the country) giving day long workshops for young people from around the country as a part of their Youth Challenge Program.

In October of 1999, The State of the World Forum chose me to be the facilitator of their prestigious Emerging Leaders Program. I have also been a core member of Canada’s Youth Environmental Network.

My passion for bringing people together for positive change first showed itself at age 18, when I founded The School Revolution – a company that led day-long workshops for student councils across Alberta. Between 1995 – 2001, I led over 80 day long youth events and retreats for over 150 schools.

Simultaneously, between 1996 and 2002, I worked with Youth for Environmental Sanity (YES!) a world renowned youth organization. With YES!, I organized and facilitated over 40 week-long, summer YES! Action Camps! across North America for youth from over 40 countries representing every inhabited continent.

In 1997, I also founded YES!’s Facilitation Trainings for young leaders. In 1999, I founded Youth Jams. These week-long community building events (25 youth per event) continue to connect and support young, committed change makers from all around the world. That project continues on without me – and a group of the core facilitators from that project have joined together in a new project called The Global Collaborative. As of 2021, this project was still going doing more events in more countries than ever before. 

In the late nineties, I co-founded SHiZAM (the Senior High Interschool Activist Network) which tried to bring together environmental and social justice groups from different high schools around Edmonton. 

From 2006 to 2016, I hosted over one hundred, community building potlucks in my home by the river valley in Edmonton and puttered often at Noorish Cafe (sadly closed now) in Edmonton on my laptop.

Every once in a while I led workshops on Non Violent Communication in Edmonton for the community. I wasn’t certified or anything – but I found it fascinating.

In 2007, I co-founded www.thelocalgood.ca – which has became one of Edmonton’s leading hubs for green and local lifestyles. One of the main projects of The Local Good is the monthly Green Drinks events. 

My fun project in the summer of 2012 was a series of secret streetcar concerts in Edmonton. If you happen to live in town and are charmed by the idea of secret shows on a trolley in the middle of the High Level Bridge at sunset. 

In 2015 or so, I was a part of founding the Nova Scotia Gaels Jam and co-starred in Canada’s second ever Gaelic language film The Fiddler’s Reel.

I have been a founding member of 3 comedy troupes, and performed with Edmonton’s Rapid Fire Theatre from 1992 to 2017. During the end of that time I ran a live, improvised Doctor Who show, and, from 2019-2020 I performed with Matt Alden in The Storyteller: Improvised Tales Inspired by Scottish Folklore and in Kanuck’s Cantina: An Improvised Starwars show.

In 2015 or so, I tried to get The Social Yogi off the ground but I couldn’t find anyone to run it. Damn. It was a good idea.

Between Sept 2004 – Feb 2006, I dedicated myself to learning my ancestral language, Scottish Gaelic, in both Nova Scotia and Scotland. I can speak Gaelic with conversational fluency now.

I also have a blog called “Healing from Whiteness” which is a collage of thoughts, reflections & articles relevant to supporting white people (who are committed to a better day for all) in seeing the larger story of history – from how it was, to how it has come to be today and how it might be different tomorrow if we ourselves are willing to be different. On the same theme, from 2016-2018, I wrote a series of letters on the hashtag #DearWhiteMen on Facebook. One day a book may come of them.

I’m also an accomplished sleight of hand magician.

My earlier work, before Marketing for Hippies, has been featured in publications from the Edmonton Journal, Alberta Venture, The Edmonton Sun, The Globe and Mail, Alberta Report, IONS Review, Ed Magazine, React magazine and nationally on CBC Radio. In 2002, I was featured in the book Global Uprising and was chosen as one of the thirty leading young visionaries in North America by Utne Reader magazine in their September, 2002 edition.

“Within 48 hours, the program had filled beyond my expectations and almost all stuck with it for the duration.”

When I first read about Tad, I was intrigued and daunted. The more I listened to and read his messages, I was deeply impressed by his clear, compassionate, no BS approach to business, marketing, purpose, and you/me/clients.  Tad walks his talk and that resonated with me. His willingness to put himself on the line with who he is and wisdom gained from his journey stuck with me, and I finally became ready to step into what daunted me — the work he would challenge me to do. 

Honestly, my decision to step into Tad’s world as a student wasn’t about money.  I waited for the right person, right message, at the right time, for a long time.   As a healer who believes in and loves the serendipity of Life,  I had a long road of inner work to Tad.  I was impatient, felt stupid, desperate, hopeless, and couldn’t make anything happen in my business and purpose until I was ready.  I surrendered and stepped into the former Mentorship Program and whoosh, the real work began. 

After checking Tad out on his walking talking videos, reading a book or two and getting clear that our values and visions resonated, I was in.  Early on in the Mentorship Program, I attended a free in person workshop in Edmonton — I live in Montana —  in Tad’s living room  — who does that??  I began to grasp even more who he is and how he could help me, and how to bring more of my purpose out there into the world.

I am forever grateful for the open door he offered, and made it so easy to walk through.  Immediately, I felt welcomed and held.  My interpretation of some of his best advice….  Keep it simple, break it down, think outside the box, look at your values and what is needed in the moment, craft your point of view, emanate this, and put yourself out there.  You will attract those who are ready for what you offer.  No selling needed.

After working with Tad, I took my point of view message, shaped it into an email offering, sent it out to my small email list of a few hundred people for a 21 day healing program.   He suggested I break the long email down into a 4-day email sequence which was so helpful.  Within 48 hours, the program had filled beyond my expectations and almost all stuck with it for the duration.  Right person, right message, right time….. 

Now, I can move beyond the flaw in the old paradigm of business and success = more clients, more money, more fame.  To me, success = clear intent, service with heart, and Divine guidance.  I am comfortable with marketing, of not selling, of not needing money to make me who I am or make my business what it is.  Success is the result of a clear energy exchange of what I offer and is received.  It is simple. 

There is nothing outside of me that makes my marketing work or makes my work better except my own inner awareness and presence that touches people through my actions for which I am compensated in myriad and abundant ways.  I paid attention to dozens and dozens of marketing ‘gurus’, geniuses, experts, teachers, tribe leaders, who all offered phenomenal sounding free programs, and THE ANSWER. 

They all preached of helping thousands and making millions.  It all sounded impressive and attractive. After getting burned by one such person, with a program I never used as it was ridiculously complicated, I just stepped back, waited and watched.   I realized that it all felt inauthentic to me — too much ego/ aka money, power, prestige, not enough heart and healing —  for me.  I didn’t need hype. I needed help. 

I am forever grateful for the personal attention and guidance, and small group energy that I received.  It was just what i needed to gain confidence, skills and strength to continue on.  Tad is a 21st century healer shaman in business mentorship clothing. He is helping shift the old ways of business and marketing from the old paradigm to a new one.   If you feel called, pulled, moved, curious and daunted, JUMP IN!  You won’t regret it!!

Anne Sexton Bryan, annesextonbryan.com

Other General Interests:

Most of my interests are woven into my bio and here on the Are We A Fit Page.

“I had a terrible time trying to learn marketing and sales before meeting Tad.”

 I had a terrible time trying to learn marketing and sales before meeting Tad. My first bad experience was that I was preyed on when I was very new in business and very vulnerable. I ended up spending a huge amount on a coaching programme where the coach didn’t engage with me after she got the money. 

My second bad experience was a marketing programme where I was taught how to manipulate people by poking their pain points, making them feel lack and selling the dream result. I was told this was for the client’s own good to make them take action. But it didn’t feel right. It felt quite awful actually and because everyone else in the course was doing it without question, it made me think there was something wrong with me.

When I first found Tad, I was at a point where I was so disheartened with the marketing I had been learning that I asked in a Facebook group “Does anyone know someone who teaches marketing in a heart-centred way?” and someone answered “Marketing for Hippies”.  “That’s me!” I thought and I wasn’t wrong. Tad’s work resonates with me hugely and I’ve been a groupie since.  

My first impression of Tad was that I loved how straight talking he is, how wise and heart-centred. I also really enjoy how quirky and funny he is.  I initially didn’t spend money with Tad because he just had ebooks and I learn better from videos–I know I wouldn’t read the ebooks. When he advertised the Hub Marketing course, I joined because it would be video learning. And then, of course, the Membership.

I was wanting to get immersed in Tad’s work immediately when I found him, but the format of his offering didn’t suit my learning style initially.  The Membership improved that. When I finally got to experience Tad’s teaching, I felt relieved. He verbalised the problems I was having with the typical sales and marketing approach and made me feel seen and not crazy for not wanting to do the high-pressure sales and sleazy marketing that is commonplace.  

Tad’s teachings are very well thought through and they just make sense. His approach is very human for both the business owner and potential customers.  Some of the most useful advice that Tad has shared is: solve a problem for people by being the medicine for something in your community.  I’ve become so clear about what I do and how I express that on my website that when people find me, they say “You’re exactly the support I was looking for”.  There is no hard-selling or pressurised phone call, there’s just ease and a flow of the right clients getting the right support.

I also think Hub Marketing is amazing and has enabled me to step back from using social media.  Since meeting Tad and using his marketing advice, I feel much older and wiser! I have gleaned so much from Tad’s work–the nuances, the subtleties and the psychology of expressing what I offer clearly.  Marketing genuinely feels good in my system thanks to Tad.

Ciara Bruton,  ciarabruton.com

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