Success Stories in Food Processing | Ontario East

Success Stories in Food Processing

Tuque de Broue Brewery

A small-town brewery in Eastern Ontario has combined a devotion to community with a responsive, adaptable business strategy to achieve success and make its mark within the highly competitive craft beer industry. Based for more than eight years in the picturesque community of Embrun, Tuque de Broue is the passion project of former wine industry veteran Nicolas Malboeuf, who, alongside wife Margo, embarked on this venture to satiate a desire to own their own business, while pursuing their love for craft beers.
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Potter Settlement Artisan Winery

In many ways, it is the story of the ‘little winery that could.’ In the face of derision from competitors, going against the prevailing wisdom and tightly held logic that a winery located north of Highway 401 in rural Hastings County was a folly, Sandor Johnson has proved the naysayers wrong – emphatically. The creator, developer and intrepid spirit behind Potter Settlement Artisan Winery, Johnson has built a profitable and growing business based on the philosophy that quality trumps all other considerations. From the initial idea of planting a revolutionary new strain of grape, the hale and hardy Marquette, to the building of the winery itself on the farmland occupied by generations of his family near Tweed, his desire has always been to make wine of superior character; one that would wow both the expert cognoscenti of the international wine world, as well as please the palates of those closer to home seeking an exceptional and elevated taste experience many cuts above the more mass produced brands on the market.
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Pie Eyed Monk Brewery

It’s only been a year, but Pie Eyed Monk Brewery has become the talk of the town in Lindsay, as those seeking an authentic craft beer experience, incorporating excellent food and an inviting atmosphere, have been flocking to the facility to sample their tasty and refreshing wares. The story of the creation of what has become a genuine culinary attraction, blending modern amenities and design aesthetic with the charm of the original Victorian brick structure, is a remarkable tale of community spirit and entrepreneurial acumen. In short, a need was identified and filled by a collection of local business leaders taking advantage of a prime, but underused locale, anchored by a thriving craft beer operation, melded with a delightfully inviting restaurant and event space. Pie Eyed Monk Brewery has been a boon to the tourism and culinary sectors within the region, and their success continues to grow along with their reputation for service excellence.
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Wilton Cheese Factory

With many families showing greater interest in where their food comes from, how it’s produced and what ingredients are used, the simple, homespun, all-natural cheese making techniques that the folks at Wilton Cheese have been using for decades are as important as they have ever been. It’s that constant and consistent dedication to quality, to natural methods and ingredients that has made the company a staple on local dinner tables, lunch boxes, retailers and restaurants for years, and has also made the factory itself a kind of food tourism destination for three or four generations of families.
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AD Snacks

Imagine a product that requires no advertising, very little marketing, and no overhead costs. It’s a golden nugget, it is the product that sells itself. And that’s exactly what Peter and Angela Joyce’s customers claim about their pepperoni. “It came organically. Our customers said to us ‘you don’t have to sell this, just let people taste it. The product sells itself'. So we trademarked 'the taste that sells itself'.”, explains Peter when describing how they came up with their pepperoni’s brand.
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Golden Moment Farm

Maple syrup production at Golden Moment Farm started on a small scale when the couple bought the property in 1997 preparing for retirement from the federal government. Today, their products are sold at locations in Kingston, Brockville, Smiths Falls and Merrickville. "We started with 200 taps by bucket and we've gone to 1,200 taps on pipeline in 18 years," says John, adding they use reverse osmosis. "We will probably go up to 2,000 taps before we retire."
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Mariposa Dairy

It is an amazing phenomenon to see a business that started off simply as a passionate part-time project turn into a large-scale and industry leading enterprise. This is exactly what has happened with Lindsay, Ontario’s Mariposa Dairy. Demonstrating a remarkable foresight, the husband and wife team of Sharon and Bruce VandenBerg chose the creation and sales of tasty varieties of goat cheese as their modest entrepreneurial endeavour nearly 30 years ago. It was seen as a niche, artisanal product at the time that could be marketed to a small minority of folks (primarily urbanites) who were very conscious of dietary restrictions related to bovine dairy products, and those who had developed a penchant for more natural-based, small batch-made products.
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Green Gables Vines

A local couple with a passion for winemaking is transforming a vineyard into a destination meeting place. Green Gables Vines owner Marie Chinnatamby and winemaker Richard Deslandes are pleased to be offering an exciting selection of white, rosé, off-dry, dry red and fruit-flavoured wines at the winery. "This is a lot of fun," says Richard, who has been crafting with care new blends from the five-acre vineyard. "People seem to want to taste local wines and buy local," he says. "We chose to offer an organic, high-quality product even when it means a lower production volume. There are no herbicides or pesticides used to produce our wines. We accept a few more weeds to get better, healthier wine," says Richard.
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Stone Crop Acres Winery

A combination of many serendipitous opportunities and the wisdom, know-how and willingness to take full advantage of those opportunities could be said to be the ‘secret’ of success for Norene Hyatt-Gervais, owner and winemaker of Morrisburg’s popular Stone Crop Acres Winery, which is celebrating its first anniversary this July.
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4 Degrees Brewing Company

Get the founders of 4 Degrees Brewing Company, Nick Ritchie and Andrew Howard, talking about beer and it’s easy to see where their passion lies – with the cold, frothy, hoppy brew that’s taken the Ontario food and drink industry by storm, and is set to do the same in Smiths Falls. With breweries popping up in virtually every community in Eastern Ontario, you’d think people would tire of hearing about yet another opening, but it seems there’s no end in sight for the craft brewery trend, least of all in Smiths Falls. Here, the local community has rallied around 4 Degrees, and waited patiently for more than five years for its arrival.
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