Empire Co., owners of Sobey’s has purchased the 28-store chain known as Farm Boy. Farm Boy, which began in Ottawa, and has what is called “a cult-like following” for its fresh produce selection, prepared meals and in-house brand products like lemon-garlic dressing, fermented garlic flowers and chocolate chip cookie chips. Empire’s last acquisition of the much larger Safeway chain in western Canada was an integration disaster. Analysts find this purchase a tastier morsel, including the price of $800 million and an exceedingly cute name. Farm Boy has stayed out of Toronto but has locations in places like Whitby and Oakville.
ORGANIC GARAGE
A smaller grocery store chain with a cute name is Organic Garage. It is scheduled to open in an 80,000 sq. foot plaza at the corner of Laird Drive and Canvarco Rd. known as 33 Laird. The timetable for construction seems elusive. Work was said to be set to start “soon” last December. Other tenants of 33 Laird announced in December are Dogtopia, a US-based dog care, boarding and spa service, a bath vanity shop called Happy Bathroom, Vivo Pizza/Pasta, Salons by JC and Glowzone, a recreational business that boasts glow-in-the-dark mini-golf. Organic Garage has three stores. They are in the Entertainment District, the Junction and Oakville.
INSTACART
Instacart says Tuesday it will transform its Toronto office into a tech hub and expand it by 200 employees over the next several years beginning in 2019. The California-based company says the Canadian location will be the second one to focus on research and development. The first is in San Francisco. The online grocery app company already has more than 80 employees at its current Toronto office. The location of the “Toronto office” is unstated in news reports and is not given online. This is a common practice of service companies which mostly don’t want anyone to know where they are.
