Why getting more Canadian products on store shelves isn't as easy as flipping a switch

Article content The push to buy local is going strong. With the 25-per-cent tariffs on pause until at least March 5, Canadians continue to rethink their purchases, sharing their favourite local brands on social media and developing apps to help identify them. Yet there’s a rub for those who want to support homegrown products and the companies that make them.

Buying local isn’t always straightforward, and selling local has its own challenges. One B.C.



farmer has reportedly found selling leafy greens to American retailers easier than Canadian ones. “We didn’t expect that it would be this frustrating and that it would take this long,” Bahram Rashti, owner of UP Vertical Farms in Pitt Meadows, told Global News about the three-year effort. When customers’ priorities change rapidly, such as in the wake of the U.

S. tariffs, getting more Canadian products on store shelves isn’t necessarily as easy as flipping a switch, says Janice Rudkowski, an assistant professor at Toronto Metropolitan University’s Ted Rogers School of Retail Management . “Even though there are a lot of transactional relationships out there between retailers and suppliers, there are also deep-rooted, collaborative relationships built over years.

” Large food retailers have well-established systems and rigorous vetting processes. According to Rudkowski, limiting the number of suppliers can benefit them: the more you have, the more complex your supply chains and logistics systems become. Like UP Vertical Farms’ experience, some suppliers nurture relationships for years before retailers list their products.

Responding to a swift shift in consumer desires can be challenging. “They both have to rethink their business models,” says Rudkowski. Small local suppliers might have to change their operations and adjust capacity, which takes investment and time.

For retailers, putting a new product on the shelf means removing another. With listing fees already paid for the existing item, delisting it could take months or years, depending on the contract. The fresh produce industry depends on handshakes, word of mouth and verbal promises of sales, says Markus Pfenning, general manager of Pfenning’s Organic Farm , a grower, packer and distributor in New Hamburg, Ont.

, with more than 250 retail clients. If Pfenning’s buys carrots from a partner farm, that farmer takes their word that they’ll follow through. “Those relationships are super, super important because that trust is super, super important.

” Pfenning has noticed a new dedication to buying local. “We’ve had customers specifically ask if it’s available locally: ‘I don’t want U.S.

,’ and we said, ‘Perfect, that’s the whole way we operate,'” he says, laughing. “We’re a very local-first company.” Until recently, it was a given to see American produce such as onions in stores, even though plenty of Canadian ones are available until April.

Again, this comes down to established relationships. “A lot of those relationships have been built through having (such) free trade,” says Pfenning. “If there’s an American company that can supply you year-round, well, a lot of people will only buy from them.

” Pfenning sees people’s awareness of where their food comes from as the silver lining of the tariff threats. “I think that it’s going to affect our industry in a positive way if people are paying attention and consumers are using their dollars to vote for the things that they want.” Jessie Sosnicki, co-owner of family farm and food processor Sosnicki Organics in Waterford, Ont.

, has seen new faces at farmers’ markets and expects the heightened interest to continue into the summer. Sosnicki did a lot of wholesale in the past, but today sells at farmers’ markets and directly to consumers through a home delivery program. Scaling back made sense financially, and Sosnicki also considers it a responsible farming choice.

Buying more land wasn’t an option; preserving the integrity of their just under 100 acres was a priority. “To do that, we needed to find those channels, those local channels that were direct, rather than take a pay cut and then have more volume come off the land and make less money, ultimately.” They adjusted their “VIP” program this year so prices could remain the same, including cutting delivery days from four to two.

“Upping the price was not an option,” says Sosnicki. “I wanted to stand my ground. With everything that’s happening, we can still grow.

We can do this locally. We don’t have to increase our prices.” Whether shopping at farmers’ markets or seeking out local brands at the grocery store, many Canadians are shifting their habits to support homegrown businesses.

Rudkowski thinks that collectively, these selective decisions will have an impact. And though larger stores may have less flexibility to bring on local suppliers, she notes that some long-standing practices have taken on new resonance, one of which is Waypoint Convenience’s Crafted in Canada program. With 248 locations at gas stations in small communities such as Cold Lake, Alta.

, Vanderhoof, B.C., and The Pas, Man.

, BG Fuels launched the Waypoint Convenience brand in 2019 — along with a spotlight on Canadian-made products. Olga Pigeon, director of marketing and convenience retail for BG Fuels, says they recognized the strength of the national chain as a community hub and partnered with local vendors to offer products such as butter tarts and cheese curds alongside standard convenience store fare like Kit Kats and Lay’s chips. Distribution has been the biggest challenge, says Pigeon.

“It’s great to find someone in a small community, but can they produce enough for the demand is one thing, but also, how do they get the product to the stores?” Since the program started six years ago (initially called Localicious), Crafted in Canada has grown to encompass “hyper-local” products and broader Canadian brands. At Waypoint Odessa, for example, they sell fresh cheese curds from the Wilton Cheese Factory six kilometres away — a regional food with a short shelf life that wouldn’t travel as well or be as popular outside of eastern Ontario and Quebec. Brands that fit wider distribution, such as Covered Bridge Potato Chips , Sapsucker sparkling water and Twigz Pretzels , are available throughout various provinces.

With the reinvigorated movement to buy local, having established relationships with suppliers and a national distributor is an advantage, though it wasn’t by design, says Pigeon. “It really is authentic. We didn’t do it to come across as anything other than it was important to our local communities, which is where our businesses are.

Those relationships were important for our retailers to have — our customers to have.” Companies are now being forced to respond to their consumers’ desire for local products, but diversifying the types of relationships they have — and nurturing them — is just good practice, says Rudkowski. “When times are tough, that’s ultimately what brings us all together, and that’s where we look to — our relationships.

Relationships happen in business. They happen in our personal lives. At the times when we’re tested, who are you going to go to? You go to people that you trust.

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