FMS Solutions Holdings LLC has brought on Mike Sharpe to lead its Canadian sales strategies.

Sharpe, an employee of the Sharpe’s Food Market family in Campbellford, Ont., is a third-generation grocer. This allows him to bring a unique, seasoned perspective to his work with FMS.

“I have lived and breathed the grocery industry since I was a child,” he says. “In 2014, we brought in FMS to help with our payroll and accounting. I was so impressed by the services that FMS provides to my family’s business that I joined their team with the intention of helping other independent grocers across Canada.”

“We’re very excited to have Mike on board,” says FMS vice-president Mark Ehleben. “Our goal is to prove to Canadian independents that with our accounting and payroll services, best practices, and benchmarking, they can be in a better position to thrive in a competitive industry. Mike is a great fit coming from grocery and knowing the unique challenges that Canadian independent grocers face.”

Located in Baltimore, Maryland, FMS provides more than 3,500 independent grocers with financial, accounting and consulting services such as industry benchmarking, best practices, and mission-critical decision support throughout the United States, Canada, and the Caribbean. With the addition of Sharpe, FMS has solidified its place as a leader of financial services to independent grocers in Canada.

According to a Globe and Mail report, the Competition Bureau has amped up its investigation of Loblaws’ pricing practices.

John Pecman, Commissioner of Competition at the Competition Bureau, has requested that the Federal Court force four of Loblaws’ key suppliers to produce sworn evidence about their dealings with the grocer. This will determine whether Loblaws activities could be anti-competitive when compared with the same dealings at key rival retailers. This comes nearly three years after the bureau launched its original investigation into Loblaw’s pricing practices.

Pecman believes that Loblaws may still be conducting some questionable practices, forcing suppliers to meet predetermined profit margins based on the advertised prices of competing retailers. The bureau is concerned about multiple Loblaw’s supplier programs, worrying that they are an abuse of its dominant industry position.

Pecman adds that many suppliers haven’t co-operated with the bureau for fear of retaliation by Loblaw. This has prompted the federal agency to seek court orders, forcing vendors to comply.

The four suppliers in question include General Mills, Wrigley, Reckitt Benckiser (Canada) Inc. and A. Lassonde Inc. The Canadian Federation of Independent Grocers has called for a code of conduct to regulate grocer-supplier practices, although large retailers oppose such government intervention.

This week, the debate between Walmart Canada and Visa over merchant fees escalated once again. Now, the retail giant has stopped accepting Visa at its 16 Manitoba locations.

This follows Walmart’s mid-July refusal of Visa credit cards at its three stores in Thunder Bay, Ontario. At this time, the retailer argued that the financial services firm charges too much in service fees to merchants. However, Visa says it offered Walmart one of the lowest rates for any merchant in the country.

In June, Walmart announced that it would expand its phase-out of Visa to all of its Canadian stores. However, it is unclear which locations will come next.

The Retail Council of Canada notes that the average merchant fee of 1.5 per cent charged by Visa and MasterCard is higher than rates charged in other countries.The council has called on the federal government to review the situation, intervene, and lower fees for all merchants.

The review will take into account the impact of Visa and MasterCard’s recent voluntary fee reductions, the adoption of a code of conduct for the country’s credit and debit card industry, and approaches in other jurisdictions.

As of now, 19 Walmart locations have stopped accepting Visa across the country: three in Thunder Bay, Ontario, and 16 in Manitoba.

Health Canada is revamping the country’s healthy eating guidelines with new rules for marketing and labelling children’s foods.

Health Minister Jane Philpott says that the “iconic” current Canada Food Guide does not match the country’s changing demographics and lifestyles. Philpott notes that the guide must be “relevant and practical,” individualized, and adaptable for food preferences and sensitivities.

However, it will take anywhere from 5 to 10 years to implement these changes, after consultations with industry, stakeholders and the public.​

Consultations will wrap up December 8, 2016. Philpott says the Healthy Canada strategy has three pillars, including healthy eating, the promotion of physical activity, as well as mental health initiatives.

With these new guidelines, natural, organic, and nutritious children’s foods will be better able to dominate the market due to increased consumer awareness. As these regulations come to fruition, consider stocking your shelves with goods that are sure to meet—and exceed—changing consumer expectations.

While online grocery sales have spiked in Europe, Canadian retailers are struggling to engage consumers with the new service.

According to Forrester Research, Canada’s online grocery shopping market is expected to grow to sales of $3.6 billion per year by 2019. However, Suthamie Poologasingham, a consultant from J.C. Williams group noted at Toronto’s Grocery Innovations Canada conference that the market is currently at less than $2 billion.

“Canadian retailers are still very much in a stage of testing and trying to figure out the cost infrastructure,” she said, adding that retailers must get consumers comfortable with the new service.

With giants like Loblaws, Walmart and Grocery Gateway offering these services, independent retailers may feel pressured to release similar programs. However, Canadian shoppers that buy their groceries online spend just four per cent of their food budgets their, buying everything else in store, added Poologasingham.

She noted that this is because in Canada, some prejudices about online shopping remain. Canadians are unsure about product quality when it comes to online orders, and may also find shipping costs too high.

Before rolling out one of these expensive services, perhaps poll your customers to determine interest. Online grocery may or may not be worth your time, money and efforts.

Last Thursday, Amazon Canada officially opened its new warehouse and distribution centre in Brampton, Ontario. To celebrate the new facility, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau stopped by for a tour.

Trudeau notes that the brand-new, high-tech facility will create more than 700 full-time jobs. The centre, which currently employs 350 people, will use cutting-edge robotic technology with traditional worker support to offer quick, high-quality support, he says.
This new initiative by Amazon is evidence to Trudeau that large multinational companies see Canada as a good place do business.

The grand opening follows Amazon’s announcement that Prime customers in Toronto and Vancouver are eligible for same-day deliveries as part of their premium plan. The offer is good for eligible orders over $25. Amazon says that eligible purchases placed in the morning through Amazon.ca would be delivered by 9 p.m. the same day in areas with Vancouver and Toronto postal codes.

However, while the new facility does indicate willingness for big box corporations to invest on Canadian soil, it has different implications for national and local retailers. With this new premium service available, small Canadian retailers may find themselves struggling to hold onto consumers.

To help keep your services from falling to the wayside, perhaps consider the implementation of various offers and deals for customers coming into your store. Treat your current clients well and use promotions to attract prospective buyers, and you’ll come out on top.

With a vast variety of social media networks available to your business, picking and choosing the right ones for your demographic can be tricky. Today, the art of social media marketing is delicate, and you must strategize in order to optimize your results.

Think about it: if you were looking to attract Millennials with your products, you wouldn’t create a television or radio commercial aimed at Baby Boomers, right? The same goes for Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. Depending on the audience you are looking to target, you need to streamline your use of various social media channels.

If you’re looking to get your product seen by Baby Boomers, place your time and energy into the social media sites they frequent most often, like Facebook. However, if you’re going after a younger audience, maybe try Millennial-friendly apps and sites like Snapchat, Instagram, Periscope, and Twitter.

This being said, your demographic isn’t the only factor you should take into account: the product you’re advertising should also influence which channels you put the most effort into. With advertising natural health or grocery products, a highly visual medium, like Instagram, can show off your product in an effective way. However, if you’re looking to add more text-based content and hyperlinks to your post, Facebook or Twitter may be the way to go.

Every social media audience is different, and must be catered to as such. Strategize your Internet efforts, and you will be rewarded with a loyal, active following of potential customers.

According to a new survey from the Organic Trade Association (OTA), more than half of organic shoppers are millennials with children.

The study notes that parents 18 to 34 years old represent the largest group of organic consumers in US. Moreover, among American mothers and fathers, 52 per cent of organic consumers are millennials, compared with 35 per cent of Generation X parents and 14 per cent of Baby Boomer parents.

“The market is diversifying,” says Laura Batcha, executive director and CEO of OTA. “The younger folks are adopting it quickly, but for many of these millennials, I like to think of them as second generation. Many of them were raised on organic products. It’s not a new idea they’re embracing; it’s just something that’s incorporated into their way of thinking.”

Batcha adds that millennial consumers are more likely to view the organic label as trustworthy and relevant.

“Many of these folks [are] second-generation organic and [have] a well-rounded, sophisticated understanding about what it means,” she notes.

This makes these consumers a perfect target for organic retailers. As such, ensure that your shelves are well stocked and branded to appeal to this discerning group of buyers.

“One thing we do know is shoppers of organic have some habits that make them very attractive to retailers,” she said. “Those shoppers are coveted amongst retailers because they typically shop more often, more trips in a week and have higher basket sizes than non-organic buyers.”

Hyland’s baby teething products were recently pulled from the market in the US over what the FDA deemed “potential health risks.” However, the products—which the company insists are safe—are still available to Canadian consumers.

Last month, the FDA warned against the general use of homeopathic teething gels and tablets, saying the products could pose a risk to infants and children.

The organization also noted that teething could be managed without over-the-counter products.

The FDA warning was released after a child was reported to have had a seizure due to use of these products. The FDA then launched an investigation, which found more than 400 reports of adverse events—such as fever, seizures and even death— associated with homeopathic teething products over the past six years.

Despite this, “Hyland’s baby teething medicines remain in distribution in Canada,” company spokeswoman Mary Borneman told the Globe and Mail. “We have chosen to discontinue the product line in the U.S. because of the FDA’s general warning against the use of these medicines. We are confident the product is safe so we can continue to distribute in areas that do not have a similar warning.”

On October 11, Hyland’s wrote to its US consumers, explaining that due to “confusion among parents” created by the warning, it would no longer be distributed across the nation.

Health Canada notes that it is aware of the FDA warning, and suggests that parents with concerns about these products should speak with a health-care professional. If your customers are concerned about this issue, help to sort out their confusion. Discuss with them the true benefits and pitfalls of homeopathic teething products and help them to understand why the FDA is making these claims.

In an attempt to resolve tensions between the growing bottled water industry, an exploding population and escalating climate change issues, Ontario’s government has proposed a moratorium on bottled water.

Specifically, the government wants to ban the creation or expansion of bottled water operations fed by Ontarian groundwater for two years.

“Water bottling is a different kind of industry and we need to treat it differently,” says Kathleen Wynne, Ontario’s premier. “Thirty years ago, we wouldn’t have envisioned an industry that took water and put it in plastic bottles so that people could carry it around.”

The organization adds that the proposed moratorium would allow them to gain a better grasp on the current state of groundwater supplies in Ontario.

“With a changing climate, and specifically with the impacts from drought and increasing population growth, we want to work with the people of Ontario to make sure we are properly protecting this vital resource,” says Glen Murray, Ontario’s minister of the environment and climate change.

Moreover, the regulations would impose stricter controls on existing bottled water operations. This would include shortening the duration of permits from ten years to five years, as well as imposing mandatory reductions during times of drought.

The suggested changes are open to public comment for the next 45 days. Additionally, they will be paired with an evaluation of the prices currently being charged to bottled water companies.