WHO IS FOX & OAK: THE PEOPLE BEHIND THE BUSINESS
Fox & Oak – Co-Owner, Brittany van Dyck
Written by Stacy Thomas
Photo by Angela Bliss
Brittany van Dyck and her husband Chris were the owners of a busy visual effects studio in Vancouver when they started looking around for a new place to live.
They had been splitting their time between Canada and New Zealand while he worked on The Hobbit, and they loved the landscape there – The Hobbit had been his favourite book as a child.
When she became pregnant with their third child, the travelling back and forth on the plane stopped being possible, and the couple started weighing their options.
“We looked into the closest thing to New Zealand from Vancouver and thought, let’s try Squamish,” says Brittany. They moved in 2016 and promptly fell in love with the area. Leaving East Van was hard, she admits. But small-town life has proven to be the lifestyle they were looking for after all.
“Being in a small town has blown my mind. It’s pretty special. Everybody knows each other, we’ve seen so much love and so much support for each other in general.” Having sold their visual effects company, the van Dycks started looking around for a new business to start. It was a chance encounter at a local games night that led to the coffee and doughnut shop they are running today.
That fateful night in 2018, they met Luke and Tessa Roderick—both local food and beverage stars—and they hit it off immediately, and over a game of Carcassonne the foursome hatched the plan that turned into Fox & Oak three years later. The Rodericks had the food and beverage skills and experience they lacked, and a passion to open a coffee and doughnuts shop. The van Dycks had the business know-how. It was a perfect match, with each person bringing their unique experience to the table; Tessa is a red seal baker who previously worked with Tall Tree Bakery, and Luke is a coffee aficionado who learned his chops at the famous Stumptown Coffee Roasters in Portland, Oregon.
“We got pretty lucky, finding each other, because we independently all have separate skills that we offer,” Brittany says. “I think it’s amazing that we all carry a different weight, and that feels easier for each of us because those are our skills, but our passions as well…that’s the beauty of the partnership. We all feel like we have our dream jobs.”
Brittany, who was raised on Thetis Island and went to high school in Whistler, calls herself the “hippie” of the bunch, and she’s perfectly happy in her role as the lead on engagement and design of the space. The pandemic derailed things for awhile, and she can’t wait for when she is able to fulfill their vision of the café as a bustling, cozy community hub with intimate seating and games nights.
“My greatest passion is serving and bringing people together,” she says. “Design and aesthetic play a big part of this for me, as I believe the environments we meet in provide the warmth and security to feel safe and welcomed. From the first week our family moved to Squamish, I wanted to help create this for our community and we have been so grateful for the support and enthusiasm we have been shown since we were able to open our doors.”
