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I help organizations learn and market their products and services better. I am not biased to any particular marketing technique, channel, tactic or niche. I focus on the best solution to solve an issue or capture an opportunity, even if that means someone else coming in to do the work.

With over 17 years of experience and an ongoing fascination for all things marketing, I have a breadth of marketing expertise across a deep roster of clients whom I work with directly or via partnerships such as the BDC or independent communications agencies.

For me, the best way of working is hands on, roll up my sleeves and open source  collaboration with people and teams. Of critical importance is that the team learns and grows throughout my work so that they are engaged, vested and could do it themselves the next time round.

I’m also an ambassador for Hyper Island dubbed the “digital Harvard” and helped bring their master class  to Vancouver in 2013 for the first time. I speak at and moderate panels at industry association events and I write for local, national and international trade press. 

Prior to founding Eustress Marketing Coaching, I worked at a large multinational agency in various roles in many cities including Vancouver, Dublin, Budapest, Munich and London. I ran local, national, regional and global accounts and even led local office in Vancouver. 

Blog

My call to Monster Energy

richard sandor


Yesterday, I like many others were saddened by the news of the death of Sarah Burke and then shocked by the news of the $500,000 medical bill for which there was no insurance coverage.

I was following the story via various social media feeds and was angered by the reports regarding Monster Energy. Monster Energy was the sponsor of the event that Sarah was at and training for but also Sarah was one of their profiled and sponsored athletes. Apparently, Monster Energy was editing negative comments on their FB page, had not commented or acknowledged Sarah’s death or updated their website where Sarah’s photos, bio and videos were featured. I checked out their site and sure enough…nothing!

The were calls in the Social Media space for Monster Energy to “man up” and cover the uninsured medial bills. One FB post featured Monster Energy’s phone number, an extension number and encouraged people to call.

For whatever reason I called them up. I was amazed that the phone was answered.  When I said I wanted to talk about Sarah Burke – I got no comment. I told them that I worked in marketing/PR and that they were getting slammed big time in the social media space. I wanted to provide some free advice. Doing the right thing would be smart but at least do something! For starters, acknowledge her death, put something up on FB or better yet their website.  I was asked my name and was then given a cold thank you.

Not that it was my doing but Monster Energy finally later that afternoon put up the below “Ski in Peace” post with photo on their webpage and plugged it via facebook and twitter. This was a full 24 hours after Sarah passed on. 



Should Monster Energy pay those uninsured medical bills? That is an entirely different conversation. Should they have done something…anything sooner? Absolutely. Consider this. In the time that it took them to make the above post to their website . Fundraising websites like at giveforward.com below were set up and about $200,000 was raised…. With an average of $67 per donation, that means that about 3,000 people went and donated on line.  It really is amazing how quickly and slowly movement can happen! (this might correlate to the number of lawyers involved)


Monster Energy responded at glacial pace and came across as not respectful or remotely human. In my opinion they also missed out on an opportunity to step up and harness all the emotion and grief and do something special for Sarah, her family, friends and fans and in the process show everyone what the Monster Energy brand could be about.

The moment passed them. 
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