Stuart MacLeod’s optimisim for Cape Breton has never faltered

On Might 18, Bruce Meloney, Stuart MacLeod and the late Vic Aucoin can be inducted into the Cape Breton Enterprise and Philanthropy Corridor of Fame. Enterprise reporter David Jala profiles the corridor’s class of 2022 within the second of a three-part sequence.

SYDNEY – Stuart MacLeod generally wonders how his life would have gone if he had been employed on the Sydney metal plant when he utilized to work there as a younger man within the early Nineteen Sixties.

“Am I fortunate that I didn’t get the job?” muses the 78-year-old president and CEO of the MacLeod Lorway Monetary Group.

“Possibly. Issues labored out for me. However there have been numerous guys who did work there that had good lives.”

It’s lower than every week earlier than MacLeod is to be inducted into the Cape Breton Enterprise and Philanthropy Corridor of Fame. He’s going into the corridor on the philanthropy facet in recognition of his many contributions to the group. 

However MacLeod isn’t fully comfy with the honour. It goes towards his humble nature. He’s pleased with what he’s achieved in an insurance coverage profession that has spanned nearly six many years. Nevertheless, he’d a lot fairly reminisce in regards to the friendships he made alongside the way in which, the fascinating folks he met, and the people and organizations he has helped over time.

The enterprise

“The insurance coverage facet got here simple,” mentioned MacLeod, throughout an interview in his workplace on the MacLeod Lorway constructing on Charlotte Avenue in Sydney.

“I began younger and I used to be all the time surrounded by actually good folks. And I used to be in the appropriate place on the proper time. Then we grew by means of acquisitions. We purchased a couple of companies together with these of Joan Harriss and Avi Drucker. It’s all about particular person service. We’ve all the time strived to provide our clients the absolute best private service.”

MacLeod mentioned he was closely influenced by his father, additionally named Stuart, an accountant who bought the native Vacationers Insurance coverage enterprise within the mid-Nineteen Fifties.

“My father was super-active locally and, as I’ve mentioned many instances, if he had spent extra time on enterprise he would have been a really rich man. However he spent nearly all of his time locally and just a bit little bit of it on enterprise.”

After spending a number of years away, together with stints in Calgary, Montréal and New Glasgow, MacLeod returned to Sydney within the mid-Nineteen Sixties to work at his father’s insurance coverage workplace.

“We didn’t get alongside on the job, so we labored out a plan for me to purchase the enterprise from him and that occurred in 1968,” he mentioned.

The enterprise was positioned on Dorchester Avenue within the Masonic constructing throughout from the long-since demolished and as soon as grand Isle Royale Lodge. MacLeod remained at that location till 1976 when he partnered with the late Jim Lorway to determine MacLeod Lorway and moved across the nook to 215 Charlotte St., the constructing that homes the corporate to at the present time.

“If I recall, I moved in with three workers and there have been already three right here so there have been seven of us in the beginning,” he mentioned.

“We solely had a part of the constructing. However now there are greater than 30 folks on this constructing, and greater than 80 throughout the province, and we occupy the complete constructing right here on Charlotte Avenue.”

There are actually 10 MacLeod Lorway places of work throughout Nova Scotia, together with six on Cape Breton Island.

Stuart MacLeod

• Age: 78
• Hometown: Sydney, N.S.
• Residence, Northside East Bay, N.S.
• Household: Spouse Nonie and grownup youngsters Jennifer, Robert and Leslee
• Occupation: Insurance coverage/Monetary
• Enterprise: President and CEO of MacLeod Lorway Monetary Group

Giving again

Whereas MacLeod’s enterprise profession is spectacular, he’s maybe equally well-known for his work locally. Through the years, he has been closely concerned in all kinds of fine causes. He and his firm have been main contributors to the YMCA Construct Fund and have served as a significant sponsor of occasions similar to Race the Cape, the Cape Breton Regional Hospital Basis’s As a result of You Care Cup, Women Night time Out Fundraiser for the Transition Home Basis and the Snowmobile Trip for Dad in help of the struggle towards prostate most cancers.

Different causes expensive to his coronary heart are the Boys and Women Membership, the seasonal Undertake-a-Household marketing campaign and African Orthodox Church.

MacLeod has additionally been an ever-present, behind-the-scenes promoter of native hockey. He’s a founding shareholder of the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles franchise that got here to Sydney in 1997 and served because the chair of the board from day one till Glace Bay-raised businessman Irwin Simon bought a majority share within the workforce in November 2018. MacLeod had owned an 11 per cent stake within the workforce, however now owns only one per cent of the franchise.

“Thank God for Irwin Simon — the workforce would not exist if it wasn’t for him,” he mentioned. 

However his involvement within the native hockey scene pre-dates the Eagles by greater than 25 years. The spotlight of his taking part in profession was serving because the substitute goalie one season at Sydney’s Woodill Junior Excessive Faculty. Nevertheless, MacLeod was a part of the administration of the Glace Bay/Sydney Metro Bees workforce, coached by Leo Amadio, that captured the Atlantic Junior B Hockey Championship in 1971-1972. Actually, MacLeod is the chief organizer of the workforce’s fiftieth anniversary reunion set for later this 12 months.

The squad, generally known as among the best junior groups to ever come out of Cape Breton, included gamers such because the late Greg Lynch (Cape Breton Drinks and driving pressure behind the Screaming Eagles), captain Stan MacDonald (chair of the Cape Breton Hospital Basis), Greg Thiel, Hughie Lynch and Nick Bonnar, who MacLeod described because the Brad Marchand (current pesky Boston Bruins ahead) of his day.

The long run

Though he nonetheless heads into the workplace most days, MacLeod doesn’t often arrive till after 10 a.m. and he leaves a bit early. He’s additionally given himself permission to take Wednesdays off.

All through his prolonged profession, MacLeod has witnessed the adjustments and challenges of downtown Sydney because it skilled Cape Breton’s post-industrial interval, the island’s out-migration, altering client procuring habits and the institution of the large field shops.

But he has remained a everlasting Charlotte Avenue fixture. And he sees nice promise as Cape Breton’s largest downtown undergoes upgrades, infrastructure enhancements and new building.

“When the metal plant closed we misplaced 3,000 jobs, when the mines closed we misplaced one other 6,000 jobs, and I recall there was a time on Charlotte Avenue when there have been numerous vacant buildings, shops with the home windows boarded over,” MacLeod recalled.

“However what’s been taking place over the previous couple of years has been unbelievable. There was a change in not solely the bodily look however within the angle of the group. The brand new NSCC campus on the waterfront is nice, we’re seeing younger folks beginning up companies and we’re seeing investments by folks like Irwin Simon.

“I’m very enthusiastic about the way forward for downtown Sydney and, for that matter, all of Cape Breton. It is a great spot to stay and I believe increasingly more persons are realizing that now.”