Framed photos of family back in the Philippines hang on the walls while mementoes line shelves. Her kitchen, filled with enticing smells of freshly cooked spring rolls, has all the earmarks of a well-loved gathering spot.

But it is a framed letter, hung by the front door, perfectly centred between a photo of herself and a photo of her son, Prince, that has been given the place of honour.

“Dear Archel,” the letter begins, “On behalf of the Canadian Museum of Immigration, I would like to thank you for sharing your immigration story with us.”

Archel submitted her story to the Canadian Museum of Immigration at Pier 21 through www.Sobeys110.com, a website and campaign created to celebrate Sobeys’ 110th anniversary, Canada 150 and the people who have worked to build both.

Pier 21, perched on the historic Halifax waterfront, served as the gateway to Canada for one million immigrants between 1928 and 1971. The Canadian Museum of Immigration at Pier 21 is also entrusted to share the larger story of immigration to Canada regardless of how, when or where those New Canadians arrived.

The Sobey Foundation was instrumental in the founding of the museum. It is in part because of this philanthropic support that the museum has become the place Canadians can explore our shared history as a nation shaped by immigration and the contributions newcomers make to Canada.

Newcomers like Archel.

“I wanted to tell my story,” says Archel, whose easy smile and infectious laugh belie a past full of seemingly insurmountable challenges. “I wanted to thank Sobeys and Canada.”

Archel left the Philippines in 2007 in search of a better future for her parents and seven siblings, but most of all for her son, whom she had to leave behind. He was just two years old.

After first working as a nanny in Hong Kong, Archel came to Canada in 2009, eventually being hired at the Winchester Foodland, which was soon taken over by Dan Pettigrew, the new franchise owner.

“Nobody cares more about, not just their job, but our people and our environment than Archel does,” says Dan. “She’s got the biggest heart of any person that I’ve ever met. She’s honestly my hero. The things that she has accomplished, I could never have done.”

Archie, as her co-workers affectionately call her, diligently sent money home to the Philippines to help her family care for her son and to send her brothers to university. She also built her parents a two-storey duplex to help protect them from regular flooding.

Eight years after leaving the Philippines, Archel was able to bring her son to Canada to live. Now 12, Prince is a happy, well-adjusted boy who loves nothing more than to play soccer with his friends.

“He is my life and strength,” Archel wrote in her letter to Pier 21. “Happy 110th year Anniversary Sobeys and 150th Year Anniversary Canada. God bless you all!”

A crowd has gathered alongside the road to watch the wagon and other participants in the community parade through Stellarton, Nova Scotia, in 1907.

Among the crowd that has gathered to watch the parade is a little girl. Dressed all in white, the girl has a front row spot from which to view the procession. Unbeknownst to her, it is also a front row to history.

Viewed from 110 years out, J.W.’s idea was simple: deliver good food to neighbours. The idea, however, was hugely innovative at the time. Thanks to J.W. Sobey, the little girl at the parade along with her family and neighbours would soon be able to rely on getting fresh meat, sourced from local farmers, processed safely and delivered promptly.

But more than the profound impact that J.W. Sobey would have on the Canadian grocery business, the photo also represents one of the values at the very core of Sobeys: Proudly Serve Our Communities. Because of this commitment, countless Canadians have benefited both directly and indirectly from the Sobey family’s philanthropic work.

The Sobey Foundation, founded in 1982 by Frank H. Sobey and his three sons Bill, David and Donald, is committed to improving the lives of individuals through investments in health, education and community. Although the Foundation works with organizations across Canada, it primarily supports organizations whose activities make a difference in Atlantic Canada.

The Frank H. Sobey Awards for Excellence in Business Studies began in 1989 to support the development of future business leaders and business programs in Atlantic Canadian

Universities. Since 1989, more than $1,500,000 has been awarded to business students in Atlantic Canada.

The Sobey Art Foundation was established in 1981 with the mandate to carry on the work of Frank H. Sobey who was a dedicated collector of investment-quality Canadian art. The Foundation continues to work to preserve representative examples of 19th and 20th century Canadian art. In 2002, the Sobey Art Foundation created the Sobey Art Award and, in the few short years since its introduction, it has become Canada’s preeminent award for contemporary Canadian art.

Maximizing positive outcomes in the lives of individuals and communities is at the heart of the Sobey Foundation’s philosophy. The impact of the foundation’s work extends far beyond the borders of Atlantic Canada, reaching Canadians across the country.

The Sobey Wall of Honour at the Canadian Museum of Immigration at Pier 21 is perhaps the most broadly encompassing of all the philanthropic legacies of The Sobey Foundation. More than one-million immigrants passed through the doors of Pier 21 between 1928 and 1971 on their way to a new life in Canada.

The historic site on the Halifax waterfront has been restored and preserved thanks in large part to the work of The Sobey Foundation. It is here, spanning the full height of the museum’s red brick walls, that Canadians can pay tribute to their own journey or that of their ancestors by adding an inscribed metal brick to the Sobey Wall of Honour. These bricks, along with the stories collected in the museum’s archives, tell the story of Canada and of the Canadians who helped build this country.

The Sobey Foundation’s support of the museum is borne out of admiration for the immigrant experience, no matter where it played out. It is also fuelled by a desire to create an extraordinary storybook for all Canadians that celebrates our shared history.

Celebrating the cultural fabric of our country and preserving our collective heritage is at the core of the Sobey family’s philanthropy. Saving the stories of our nation means that we can look back and recognize when history was made in front of our very eyes. Much like it did in front of that little girl in white watching an oxen team pull a meat wagon during a community parade in 1907.

And while the Matrix is the brains of the RSC, the heart and soul are the people who work there. Inside the walls of the warehouse is a microcosm of global society: the 330 employees who work at the Vaughan warehouse come from 63 countries around the world.

Walk down the hallway that leads to the lunch room and you’ll pass a large map with colourful pins to point out every hometown across the globe that is represented between those four walls.

“We built a culture which is very tightly knit,” says Shilpa Sibal, Manager, Human Resources, Vaughan RSC. “We genuinely look out for one another, we have a mutual level of respect for one another, because we’re all here to provide for our loved ones, regardless of who we are or where we came from.”

At 784,000 sq. ft., Vaughan RSC is larger than Toronto’s Union Station. So large, in fact, that employees not driving a piece of equipment can use a three-wheel bicycle to get around. About 950,000 grocery cases are shipped from the facility each week in addition to 400,000 cases a week from the new refrigerated side of the building where employees work in parkas.

“We like to introduce our facility as a door of opportunities,” says Shilpa, who is proud that Sobeys offers so many new Canadians their first job in this country. “When you come in, this is not the be all and end all. We provide all employees with the opportunity to grow, learn and progress.

“We have many different individuals who have started off with this as their first job or a part-time job,” says Shilpa. “Many have taken the opportunity and have gone different ways within the organization.”

Sobeys has 25 RSCs (also known as Distribution Centres) across Canada, each with its own uniquely composed family of employees.

The teams reflect the communities in which they are located. At the new Rocky View RSC just outside of Calgary, for instance, countries around the world are represented in the workforce. 

To celebrate that diversity, Rocky View encourages employees to share their traditions through Celebration Lunches during which employees bring in food to mark festivals or holidays such as Diwali, Festival of Baisakhi and Dussehra.

In Vaughan, Ont., the RSC workforce reflects a community that is diverse and home to thousands of new Canadians.

To help celebrate the multicultural mosaic that is their community, the Vaughan warehouse hosts a regular potluck, encouraging employees to cook a dish that is special to their traditions and heritage.

“Food brings people together,” says Sam Scrivo, Shift Lead, Afternoons at Vaughan RSC. “I really believe in that.”

Sam began the potlucks as a team-building exercise and has continued them because of the positive impact it’s had on the staff.

“They cook at home from scratch and make it a point to offer it to you. Many of them say: ‘Try this, please.’ They can’t wait for you to try their food,” laughs Sam.

“At the beginning of a potluck, we feel very excited. At the end of a potluck, we feel very full,” says Sam. “They are always asking ‘When are we doing it again?’

“There are so many cultures out there, so many varieties of food and what dishes they prepare,” says Sam. “We are a very multi-cultural warehouse. It makes Sobeys a better company.”

]]> https://www.sobeys110.com/en/stories/terrebonne/ Fri, 25 Aug 2017 16:43:09 +0000 http://www.sobeys110.com/?post_type=stories&p=1873 The huge commitment that Sobeys has made to serving Canadians from coast to coast requires an equally impressive supply chain to back up that promise. It isn’t enough to have big warehouses. The logistics of moving product across the country requires innovation and bold thinking.

Distribution has changed unimaginably in the 110 years since Sobeys started out in rural Nova Scotia, but one thing that hasn’t changed in all of that time is Sobeys’ commitment to bringing great, fresh food to every customer across the country.

The nature of the retail grocery business is still simple, says Eric Seguin, Sobeys Senior Vice-President, Distribution and Logistics. “The moment of truth is when people go grocery shopping. The customer wants to be able to find what they are looking for. It has to be fresh.”

The store, he says, is the “main stage of the business.” That makes the behind-the-scenes distribution network — including the men and women who get product on shelves to give customers an outstanding shopping experience — the critical backstage.

That’s why Sobeys is investing so heavily in the supply chain — and in the future — by building a simplified, efficient supply chain for more than 1,500 Sobeys and affiliate stores. Sobeys first opened the $150-million fully-automated Vaughan, Ont., RSC followed by the RSC in Terrebonne, Que., while the new Rocky View RSC in Alberta will serve the West.

As a measure of its commitment to Canadians, Sobeys is the only retailer in the country to use this technology.

With a $168-million investment, the Terrebonne facility replaced two existing RSCs in Quebec when it started shipping in January 2013. The challenge was huge: build a fully-automated single delivery and distribution point for grocery and tobacco products in Quebec and New Brunswick.

There were, naturally, the inevitable technical issues. As well, efficiencies had to be found and organizational synergies created.

As much as anything, the Sobeys team had to work around the clock to master WITRON Integrated Logistics’ world-class technology.

But the hundreds of Sobeys employees rose to the task in a way that Eric Seguin says demonstrated the team’s “resilience and force of character.”

That’s obvious to anyone who enters 470,000 square-foot Quebec facility. Thirteen million pounds of steel went into the 70-foot-high building which features 64 dock doors — 28 for receiving and 36 for shipping — and houses 12,000 different Sobeys products.

But it’s the efficiency — the improved quality of service — more than the scale that impresses. WITRON’s automated system is setting records for accuracy and speed of delivery. Terrebonne RSC ranks in the top three of WITRON’s 50 projects across the world in terms of efficiency and contributes to the training for new WITRON employees, which the company brings from far and wide to Quebec.

Since it opened, some 4,000 people outside of Sobeys and from around the world have visited Terrebonne to see it in action. The reason: Terrebonne has quickly become the gold standard for other companies looking to automate distribution.

The level of automation also means the RSC is adaptable enough to meet the needs of any store. For example, pallets are loaded in a way that takes into consideration each store’s configuration, ensuring for instance, that since chips and soft drinks go on shelves in the same aisles in all Sobeys stores, they are packed on pallets that way at the warehouse, meaning unpacking is swift and efficient at the other end. Other products are packed according to each store’s configuration.

The leadership based on collaboration and partnership between our suppliers and our employees contributed to the achievement of a common goal: more than one million cases and units shipped weekly out of Terrebonne’s automated warehouse.

While the process is automated at Terrebonne, Vaughan and Rocky View, it’s the Sobeys employees behind the scenes who are making these world-class facilities a success. At Sobeys, bringing great food to customers has been at the very core for 110 years.

The women gather around, discussing the photos animatedly. “It is so beautiful,” one woman says, clearly delighted at having caught a glimpse of the past. Such is the allure of Les Marchés Lambert, a mainstay of these suburban communities for close to 150 years.

Aimé Lambert opened a general store in 1873 in Saint-Basile-le-Grand, eventually expanding his business to the current total of six supermarkets along with convenience stores and gas stations. Along the way, the Lambert family earned the respect of their customers and neighbours for their commitment to providing quality local food and for supporting their communities.

It is a story that echoes that of the Sobey family whose values of supporting local suppliers and providing for neighbours hasn’t changed in 110 years. As it is with Sobeys, the beating heart of Les Marchés Lambert is a multi-generational family committed to the original vision of the founder. For almost three decades now, brothers Bruno and Luc Lambert — fourth-generation grocers — have been guiding this business built on a combination of perishable food and imperishable values.

Fostering lasting relationships with customers and staff alike is paramount for the Lamberts. “I think that in order to be successful in business, that rule and that value of respect is inescapable if you want to be in a position of create a work atmosphere that is conducive to learning,” says Luc. “ …. All of our employees find themselves in a place where they feel comfortable seizing the initiative, taking risks, and even if they make mistakes — well, it’s not that bad.”

As for customers, keeping them happy involves a continuous process of renewal and re-evaluation of how his business stacks up compared to his competitors’, says Bruno. It’s called differentiation. Delivering it every day is the product of hard work, but it also comes naturally for a man who clearly thrives on all the action and interaction involved in retail.

“The grocery business is full of colour, it’s full of smells. You socialize with the customers; you get to see a lot of people. It’s non-stop, the flow of customers. It has always fascinated me that every day, people come to us with new stories and new needs,” says Bruno.

“The food business is all about starting over. You can create a beautiful display all you want, the next morning, you have to begin again because you have sold all your product. The nicer it looks, the quicker it sells, the happier you are about it, the more frequently you have to start from scratch.”

To say that the Lambert brothers know the business inside out is an understatement. The truth is that it’s all they have ever known, really, apart from a brief interlude when they both pursued their studies. They grew up working in their parents’ store from the age of six onwards, doing all sorts of jobs from sorting bottles to bagging groceries.

In fact, they lived in the same building as their parents’ grocery store until Luc turned 10. By the time he was 27, he was in charge of the business along with Bruno, as their father was reaching retirement age.
Through the years and despite the many changes that the industry has experienced, Les Marchés Lambert have never lost their homegrown feel. They have the air of a community gathering spot that harkens back to their roots. It’s not unusual, for example, to see a young employee with his paints and brushes in the café above the store, practising his art as the scent of freshly roasted coffee fills the air.

But the picture of Les Marchés Lambert would not be complete without talking about their contributions to the community. The stores are major supporters of La Fondation Charles-Bruneau, a charity that is dedicated to improving the lives of kids with cancer in Quebec, as well as furthering research. During annual fundraising drives across the IGA extra chain in Quebec, cashiers solicit donations to the cancer foundation. There is also a charity bicycle ride sponsored by IGA — Bruno is an avid cyclist — that combines a family outing with a good cause.

That’s not all. The Lamberts are also heavily involved in supporting la Fondation Mélio, which seeks to improve the quality of life for 5,000 children with handicaps or motor-skill or language impairments. Luc’s son, who suffers from cerebral palsy, underwent treatment at the Sainte Justine pediatric research hospital for 20 years and Luc was a frequent visitor there. Now he is giving back to the hospital foundation.

Chances are this fine tradition of serving a community and reinvesting in its welfare will continue, for the fifth generation of Lamberts has now joined the business. Bruno and Luc each have a child working in the store, learning the ropes but also, no doubt, bringing a new perspective and their own innovative ideas to the table.

“We hope to replicate, in the coming years, what my great-grandfather, what my grandfather and what our parents managed to do — and that is to pass along this business to our children,” says Luc. “That’s our dream.”

Bernadette’s cheese-describing vocabulary has evolved a little since then. She now might call a Camembert “refreshing”, a Limburger “chalky” and other types everything from “salty”, “pungent”, “savoury” to “crisp smoky.”

Such evocative language is to be expected from someone like Bernadette, who keeps several volumes of her personal cheese library behind the deli counter at the Sobeys Northwood store in Waterloo, Ont.

She’s more than a self-taught keener. Bernadette is one of the 350-or-so Sobeys employees from 170 stores across the country who have completed the company’s innovative Cheese Ambassador Program and now pass on everything they’ve learned from behind the cheese counter.

“A cheese monger — a cheese expert that you would find at any small shop — is more of a European tradition,” says Kelsie Parsons, as Merchandising Integration Manager, Deli Meat and Cheese. “We’re trying to replicate that.”

It’s a case of seeing a customer’s need and responding to it. The average Sobeys store carries around 300 different cheese varieties. What’s more, customers have different expectations when buying a wheel of cheese versus, say, purchasing a bag of pasta.

The average Sobeys store carries around 300 different cheese varieties.

“With cheese they want to know how to use it, how to enjoy it, how to describe it,” says Kelsie who leads the program, passing his passion and knowledge for cheese onto the ambassadors. “They even want to know the story of the cheese, which they can then share with their family and friends.”

This is where people like Bernadette, who has been working in Waterloo for Sobeys and its predecessor companies since 1990, come in.

During the three-day Cheese Ambassador training program, employees learn about the history of cheese. Kelsie, who travels the country putting on seminars, tells them about the different styles and types. By the time the sessions are over ambassadors know not just how to describe the different cheeses, but also how to pair them with food and how to display them in the store.

No cheese ambassador session is complete without a visit to a real, live artisanal cheese-making operation. In Alberta, for example, students visit the Sylvan Star Cheese operation in Red Deer, while Nova Scotian-trained Cheese Ambassadors traditionally make an appearance at Halifax’s Blue Harbour Cheese where they learn the nuances of the craft.

In Ontario, Bernadette drove to nearby Mountainoak Cheese, which, in many ways, is emblematic of Canada’s burgeoning homegrown cheese sector. (According to federal government statistics, Canada now has more than 190 cheese makers, with Quebec being home to more cheese-making operations than any other single province.)

Adam and Hanni van Bergeijk were experienced cheese makers in Holland before moving to Ontario five years ago and starting their operation.

Adam van Bergeijk was an experienced cheese maker in Holland before moving to Ontario five years ago and starting Mountainoak Cheese.

Now, with six full-time and four part-time employees, they offer 18 different varieties of Gouda — including Bernadette’s favourite, the herbal, earthy Wild Nettle cheese — with the list growing each year.

Sobeys has been carrying Mountainoak’s cheese almost from the moment they began operation. That is really no surprise since Sobeys has understood the importance of supporting local businesses since the organization’s humble roots were forged in rural Nova Scotia 110 years ago.

“Whenever possible we support local cheese makers and carry local cheeses,” explains Kelsie.

Mountainoak is happy to return the favour. Visiting the facility helped Bernadette and the other ambassadors broaden and deepen their knowledge of cheese production and to meet folks who share the same affinity for a food that she calls “a quintessential part of Canadian life.”

Everything she learns gets passed onto Sobeys customers. Bernadette loves the versatility of cheese, so she tells customers how to grill it, how to add it to their soups and how to incorporate it in other ways when they entertain.

“There’s a flavour for every person,” she likes to say from behind the cheese counter. And Sobeys’ Waterloo cheese monger will help you find the one that is just for you.

At its Madison Square store, where about 160 full- and part-time employees work, Safeway’s staffers come from all over the world, reflecting the surrounding communities in a city that, like so much of urban Canada, is a cultural mosaic.

Customers at the Madison Square Safeway have been served this summer by a couple of enthusiastic young men sporting name tags identifying them as Andrei Caymo and Dexter Tresquio.

They are friends. But the pair have more in common than liking the same bands, sports and subjects at Winnipeg’s Saint James Collegiate where they were Grade 11 classmates this past year. Or, for that matter, a common ambition to someday become doctors.

A year ago, the boys were living in different cities in the Philippines – Dexter is from Imus and Andrei lived in Manila City. Now, after immigrating to Canada with their families, Andrei and Dexter are spending the summer participating in a Safeway-supported program designed to give young, new Canadians valuable experiences and skills for work and life.

“This is a stepping-stone for me,” Andrei says of the Newcomer Employment and Education Development Services (NEEDS) program.

It is hard for anyone starting out life in a new country. But particularly for teenagers, facing the challenges of their formative years in a place where the culture, the language, even the weather is so different from what they left behind.

Paul Miller, manager of the Madison Square Safeway in Winnipeg, Man., helps young new Canadians gain work experience by participating in the Newcomer Employment and Education Development Services program.

“Diversity is very, very important to us, as a store and as a company,” says manager Paul Miller.

This isn’t just some corporate mantra.

In Manitoba, Safeway does its bit to try to ease the burden for young newcomers. The vehicle is NEEDS, a non-profit charitable organization that has been providing support and programming to immigrant and refugee children and youth for 18 years out of the 110 that Safeway’s parent company, Sobeys Inc. has been supporting local, stressing community and putting employees and customers first.

The NEEDS program also epitomizes the value that Sobeys places on immigration. In recognition of the role new Canadians have played in helping to build the company – and Canada – The Sobey Foundation continues to make generous contributions to the Canadian Museum of Immigration at Pier 21 in Halifax.

It was there that generations of immigrants arrived in this country and while Pier 21 is no longer the first point of entry to newcomers, support from the Sobey Foundation ensures that its history will not be forgotten.

Now, along with its role in the creation of Pier 21, Sobeys supports new generations of immigrants by offering jobs through programs like NEEDS. In the past decade, Safeway has helped more than 100 students from countries such as Mali, Congo, Nigeria and Afghanistan go through the program. This year, province-wide, 10 more students will participate through positions at Safeway stores.

Paul hired Andrei and Dexter after interviewing 32 applicants. Andrei, Paul said, spoke great English and “had a real sense of urgency to him.” Dexter, on the other hand, was “very polite and well dressed” and made his goals abundantly clear: To gain work experience and to develop his communication skills in a diverse workplace.

Andrei Caymo and Dexter Tresquio say gaining experience and improving communication skills are direct benefits of the NEEDS program.

“It left me very excited,” said Dexter, not long before he and Andrei started their summer on the Safeway floor. “I think we’re going to learn so much here.”

That’s a given. They’ll be just like anybody else at Madison Square; bagging groceries, stocking shelves, replenishing the produce, stacking carts, maybe even working the cash.

Everybody wins with the NEEDS program. Safeway adds new, ambitious employees to the workforce; it also gets the warm fuzzy feeling that comes with doing something nice, not because it impacts the profit margin, but because it is simply the right thing to do.

The participants, many of whom haven’t held down a job before, benefit too. The Safeway experience provides just the kind of start that young people, growing up in a family that moves thousands of miles for a better life, dream about.

It’s a statement dropped as casually as most people talk about the weather. The passage of time has dulled the edges of the unease the Soods felt as an East Indian family living in Uganda when Idi Amin was just beginning his reign of terror, but the memories are still vivid.

“When he went to work or came home, it was in a convoy,” says Mike. “If you were there, you got off the road. If it meant going into a ditch, you went in the ditch. Otherwise they might shoot you.”

As tensions mounted, the Soods fled first to Kenya and then to Canada, arriving in 1968.

“They packed up what they could and basically came here with nothing except us,” says Deepa Sood who was four when her parents emigrated to Canada, staying with family in Calgary before making their way to Nova Scotia. “They started from scratch in little old Pictou county.”

Deepa and her brother, Vivek, who was just one when the family moved to Canada, began a life not unlike their neighbours: going to school, joining Scouts and Girl Guides, playing hockey. At times there was a twinge of feeling different – such as wearing jeans that weren’t quite the accepted style – but most often the differences were celebrated.

Introducing new friends to Punjabi food came naturally to the family and for Usha, it often meant having her children’s friends hang around the house in the hopes of snagging an invitation to dinner.

Food was the center of gatherings big and small, important and everyday. “It always was around family, friends, food, and fun and it still is,” says Vivek.

Vivek started working at Sobeys store No.1 in 1984, packing groceries. Now Executive Vice President, Related Businesses and living in Halifax with his wife, Stephanie and their daughters, Jaya and Riley, Vivek is grateful for the life his parents created and for the opportunities provided through Sobeys.

“Whether it was to Rob, or Donald, or David (Sobey), I’d absolutely say thank you,” says Vivek. “I look at all the things that changed in my life since I joined the company. There’s been a lot of transitions within that time, and I always have gotten nothing but 100 per cent support.”

It was a hope for those sorts of opportunities that brought their parents to Canada, says Deepa, who started her Sobeys career as a student working in the mailroom and in accounting.

“Today people follow money,” she says. “When my parents came, people looked for opportunity. There’s a difference between money and opportunity. I think it’s paid off pretty well. Any success I might have achieved is because of how I was brought up and where I was brought up.”

Now an Assistant Category Manager based in Stellarton, Deepa values the family culture that has remained central to Sobeys, even now that the company stretches from coast to coast.

“I can remember, to this day, seeing Donald Sobey walking to work. He had a suit on, and he’d just be walking down Foord Street,” says Deepa. “There’s never been an air. Sobeys has just always been part of our lives.”

Growing up, whenever his mother cooked seafood, she insisted on using a fork to energetically mash the flesh into a fishy porridge.

“I guess she was scared that her son would choke to death on a bone,” says Jason, 43. “But it was unidentifiable by the time she was done.”

There’s an irony in that. As director of Seafood Category Management for Sobeys West — which includes the Thrifty Foods, Safeway and Sobeys banners — his working days are all about how seafood looks and tastes, and even how it is caught.

Technically, Jason is the guy responsible for building the company’s brand in the most highly competitive seafood market in the country. Innovation is his calling card.

But his emphasis on putting customers and people first, on supporting local and stressing community, means that he’s also a shining example of the Sobeys way of doing things — a way that hasn’t wavered since the organization’s humble roots were forged back in rural Nova Scotia 110 years ago.

Those guiding principles are just words on paper without people to make them reality. Jason, who started working for Thrifty Foods as a 17-year-old high school student, is one of those employees who puts principles into action.

Today, guaranteeing that Sobeys’ seafood operation is “not just good, but great” — and builds “customer loyalty one at a time” — means ensuring that his company is the first to locate that sweet spot where “customer wants, market offerings and grassroots innovation all intersect.”

Jason’s commitment in this regard is encapsulated in his managerial mantra: “rust never sleeps” meaning that obsolescence is just around the corner, unless you stay one step ahead of it.

It led him, with the help of co-worker Michael Belbas, to create a unique program called Passion Training, which ensures the full seafood team — from office to retail — works together to make the Sobeys seafood program the best it can be.

Jason Bater, Director of Seafood Category Management for Sobeys West takes his passion for seafood on the road, inspiring employees along the way.

The program is designed to create seafood destinations among all the stores carrying the various Sobeys’ banners in Western Canada. It doesn’t just happen. “We need to give our customers a reason to come to our stores,” says Jason.

Attendees at his Passion Training sessions learn how to create bold, beautiful, market-style showcases that are “chock-full of quality seafood” and also reflect the diverse assortment that customers demand.

The road to “wow” is about more than aesthetics and design. It’s about utilizing the program’s real driver: the Sobeys employees. “It is their passion, skills and service that make our seafood program really pop and come to life,” says Jason.

At the end of the program, employees can talk the customer through the purchase as well as the handling and preparation of the product they buy. He wants his people to be innovative in an old school way — capable of on-the-spot fish preparation, just like the fishmongers of yore.

The vibe, above all, has to be right. “I love having a lot of theatre and animation,” Jason says, “a boisterous department that is full of lively seafood chatter, maybe a couple of fish flying through the air and employees who are jumping over each other to be first to serve our customers.”

He’s just the guy to instill that kind of enthusiasm. While instructing, Jason passes on the podium and walks the floor in front of the room, speaking with gestures as much as words.

Jason likes to keep things light. It is the rare educational session, for example, that doesn’t include a Seinfeld reference. “I like there to be a dialogue (between he and the participants), to be lots of give and take.”

It works. Every region that jumps on the Passion Program sees its sales jump as well. The latest numbers show that the Sobeys and Safeway banners, combined, experienced a 20 per cent year-to-year increase in seafood sales after the training.

It helps that Jason has made it his personal mission to try to sell seafood in unexpected places: all the small Prairie towns across the West, as well as the big beef-eating cities like Edmonton and Calgary.

“It is amazing what comes from working with our people to build a great program. You find that customers all across this big, diverse, beautiful country just want the same thing: good food,” he says.

And, that Sobeys, with its emphasis on community and local, is also an exemplary corporate citizen. Consider the A+ rating that Safeway recently earned from SeaChoice, which measures corporate sustainability practices in procuring fresh and frozen seafood.

Under Jason’s direction, Safeway now gets more than 90 per cent of its seafood from sustainable sources, compared to barely half in 2012. “It is important for customers to know how their money is being spent and have confidence that what they buy is sustainable,” he says.

It also matters on a personal level to Jason. His daughter, 14-year-old Katarina, may not love fish quite like her dad does but it’s enough for him to know that she will grow up able to enjoy the taste of a sockeye salmon.

For Renee Sylliboy, who manages Eskasoni’s Foodland store, which is the only full-service grocery store in the community of nearly 4,000, the feelings the powwow evokes are deep.

“I’m really proud to be who I am,” says the 41-year-old mother of four, who is distantly related to long-ago Mi’kmaw Grand Chief John Denny Sylliboy.

Eskasoni’s powwow is a coming together of residents, past and present, and a showcase for Mi’kmaq history, culture and spirituality. “We’ve come a long way as a community,” she says. “In a way, this celebrates our survival.”

Dancers are shown during the 26th Annual Eskasoni Powwow.

Renee — who was born in Eskasoni, and who lived elsewhere for her high school years and then returned — is an example of the strength of that community. She is fluent in the Mi’kmaq language and speaks it at home, as do her children who attended Mi’kmaq immersion school.

Her house is full of beautifully woven and decorated Mi’kmaq baskets. Every year Renee makes a pilgrimage to Chapel Island, in Cape Breton’s Bras d’Or Lake, the most sacred site for her people.

During the annual powwow she also does her part to honour her community, its elders and traditions. Her store, after all, supplies much of the food at the children’s picnic, one of the centrepieces for the powwow. She personally helps to persuade other vendors to donate food and prizes to make the day an unabashed success.

“We are a tight-knit community,” Renee says. “Everybody knows everybody and we all work together, our staff and our community, as a team.”

That was clearly evident in October 2016, when the tail end of hurricane Matthew brought high winds and heavy rain to Nova Scotia. Eskasoni bore the brunt of the storm as it passed over the province, causing flash floods in the community.

Winds knocked out the power and rivers overflowed, washing out roads on both ends of the reserve and flooding hundreds of houses.

Power outages meant a countless amount of food was spoiled throughout the community. That’s when Renee and Foodland jumped in to ensure no one went hungry.

Her store offered 30 per cent discounts on everything but tobacco and lottery tickets for residents of Eskasoni and the surrounding communities. Thanks to Sobeys, Foodland’s parent company, huge pallets of food arrived, both for the store and the barbecue that was held to lift people’s spirits.

At the store, there wasn’t an available shopping cart to be found. People were coming to get a load of groceries, going home, dropping it off, then coming back again for more. “It was great for the community,” says Renee.

So, the next Easter they decided to have another 30 per cent discount day. That event was successful enough that Renee is talking about making it an annual thing.

That sense of sharing and community and helping people in need is the norm in a place that has suffered the same kinds of grim hardships endured by indigenous people everywhere.

Sharing and community is the Sobey way too.

The emphasis on putting customers and people first, on supporting local and stressing community — and on helping those who need help — has been a guiding principle since the organization got its start 110 years ago, just a few hundred kilometres from Eskasoni.

Even today the original Sobey store in Stellarton extends credit to its neighbours.

During the Great Depression, Frank Sobey’s mother, Eliza, would never turn a hungry man away from her door. “If it weren’t for the likes of (Frank’s father) J.W. Sobey … we would have starved to death,” said a coal miner’s wife from that time.

The miners were J.W.’s best customers. He extended them credit, and on the Saturday payday they put money on their bills. During periods of illness, bereavement, disasters, or mine shutdowns, J.W. carried the mining families on his books until they were able to start paying back.

“A lovely man, a mild man, a fine, fine man,” someone once said of J.W. Sobey.

Later, Frank Sobey and his son William did their civic duty, serving their home community of Stellarton as mayors. In time, the family established The Sobey Foundation to improve the lives of individuals through investments in health, education and communities.

Today the tradition endures wherever the name Sobeys or the other members of its corporate family can be found. Much like in Eskasoni, where Renee does her part for the community in her own way.