Sarah Mitchell has spent the last several years trying to make sense of why Canadian businesses succeed or fail — not the textbook version, but the real one, full of bad timing, lucky breaks, and stubborn founders who wouldn't quit. She started out doing market research, spent a lot of early mornings buried in spreadsheets nobody wanted to read, and eventually realized she liked telling the story more than building the model. Now she splits her time between reporting and research, usually with too many browser tabs open and a half-finished coffee. She's currently curious about what's happening to small manufacturers outside the big cities — the ones you don't hear about unless something goes wrong.