The Food Professor

Can a sub shop in Streetsville become the world’s largest Mediterranean and Middle Eastern food franchise? Bernadette Osmow, President of Osmow’s Shawarma, makes the case. Osmow’s began when Sam Osmow left Egypt in 1998 and opened a sub shop in Streetsville, Mississauga. A shawarma concept from his homeland grew that shop into roughly 250 locations across Canada and the United States, including Halifax. Bernadette started in the business young, left to build her business acumen and follow her own interests, and has returned to lead the company with her brother. She talks about franchisee value, community service and why Osmow’s runs its own production facility to control quality, price and cost.
On policy, Sylvain previews his 32nd appearance as a parliamentary witness, this time before the House of Commons ethics committee on AI and surveillance pricing. Surveillance pricing means two shoppers seeing different prices for the same product based on personal data. Dynamic pricing means prices that move with supply and demand. Sylvain says he has seen no evidence Canadian grocers are doing the former, and argues Walmart has long used dynamic pricing upstream with suppliers.
The Canadian Dairy Commission recommended a 2.8% farm-gate increase starting February 2027, the highest since 2022 but below the 3.55% rise in production costs its own survey found. Sylvain explains why provinces may go higher and why shoppers could see 4% to 5% at retail. He also shares news of succession planning at Canada’s Food Price Report, due December 3.
In food service, the hosts debate Foodtastic’s proposed takeover of MTY, which would put Second Cup, Pita Pit and Milestones under the same roof as Thai Express and Sushi Shop, and whether the Competition Bureau would care. They also look at a New York Times report on Sysco and independent restaurants, and Kraft Heinz’s plan to sell most of its coffee business, including Maxwell House.
On the grocery side: the November-to-February supplier blackout period, now running for the first time with the Grocery Code enforced, and why Sylvain calls it archaic. Then cyberattacks that took control of store refrigeration in the Netherlands and elsewhere in Europe. Michael’s best guess points to Russia. Sylvain warns that tougher cybersecurity demands from grocers could push small suppliers out.
The episode closes with tributes to Toronto restaurateur Franco Prevedello of Centro and Guilano Boselli the founder of Ottawa’s Mamma Teresa, and a farewell to Caplansky’s at Pearson’s Terminal 3.

Join us at the Coffee Association of Canada's Annual Conference Thursday, November 12th, 2026
at Angus Glen in Toronto (Markham)

Are you ready for the Next Wave? Get Your Tickets Here

This year’s conference will bring together leaders from across the industry for a day of bold conversations, market insights, networking and inspiration, focused on the ideas, people and innovations shaping the future of coffee in Canada.

Don’t miss Canada’s premier coffee industry event — we sell out every year!

About Us
Dr. Sylvain Charlebois is a Visiting Professor in Food Policy and Distribution at McGill University and a Professor in Food Distribution and Policy in the Faculty of Management at Dalhousie University in Halifax. He is also the Senior Director of the Agri-food Analytics Lab, also located at Dalhousie University.
Known as “The Food Professor”, his current research interest lies in the broad area of food distribution, security and safety. He is one of the world’s most cited scholars in food supply chain management, food value chains and traceability with over 775 published peer-reviewed journal articles. Dr. Charlebois is also an editor for the prestigious Trends in Food Science Technology journal.
He co-hosts The Food Professor podcast, discussing issues in the food, foodservice, grocery and restaurant industries and which is the most listened Canadian management podcast in Canada.
Every year since 2012, he has published the now highly anticipated Canadian Food Price Report, which provides an overview of food price trends for the coming year. Furthermore, his research has been featured in several newspapers and media groups, nationally as well as internationally. He has testified on several occasions before parliamentary committees on food policy-related issues as an expert witness. He has been asked to act as an advisor on food and agricultural policies in many Canadian provinces and other countries.
With extensive experience collaborating with businesses, governments, and NGOs, Dr. Charlebois combines academic rigor with practical expertise, making him one of the most influential voices in the global agri-food landscape. His work continues to advance the understanding of food systems, fostering innovation and resilience in a rapidly evolving industry. In 2025, he received the prestigious Charles III medal recognizing his tremendous work in informing Canadians about food issues.
Michael LeBlanc is a senior retail advisor, keynote speaker and media entrepreneur. Michael has delivered keynotes, hosted fire-side discussions hosted senior retail executive on-stage in 1:1 interviews worldwide. Michael produces and hosts a network of leading retail trade podcasts, including The Remarkable Retail Podcast, The Voice of Retail, The Food Professor, The FEED powered by Loblaw and the Global eCommerce Leaders podcast. He has been recognized by the National Retail Federation (NRF) as a global Top Retail Voice for 2025 and 2025, and continues to be a ReThink Retail Top Retail Expert for the fifth year in a row.

Tyler has 31 years of experience and sat on PIC’s board before becoming CEO. PIC is one of Canada’s five global innovation clusters, and Sylvain calls it the strongest of the group. The harder question is whether it’s taking enough risk.
Sylvain also shares what Saskatchewan mayors and councillors asked him this week: why the CFIA is so hard to deal with, interprovincial trade barriers, how to get private capital interested in agri-food, and which export markets beyond the U.S. are worth chasing.
Out west, B.C.’s new government has Prairie producers thinking about port access. It also puts in play the Agricultural Land Reserve processing rule that Sylvain has criticized in public.
On the East Coast, High Liner Foods leaves Canadian hands after 125 years, which raises hard questions about who owns the country’s food brands. Also: permanent standard time, full Halloween candy shelves, a U.S. lawsuit over tariffs on Canadian goat cheese, Olymel’s $142-million expansion and restaurant no-shows.
Topics include:
Protein Industries Canada and plant-protein investment
B.C. agriculture and the ALR
High Liner Foods and foreign ownership
Permanent standard time
Halloween candy and goat cheese tariffs

Join us at the Coffee Association of Canada's Annual Conference Thursday, November 12th, 2026
at Angus Glen in Toronto (Markham)

Are you ready for the Next Wave? Get Your Tickets Here

This year’s conference will bring together leaders from across the industry for a day of bold conversations, market insights, networking and inspiration, focused on the ideas, people and innovations shaping the future of coffee in Canada.

Don’t miss Canada’s premier coffee industry event — we sell out every year!

About Us
Dr. Sylvain Charlebois is a Visiting Professor in Food Policy and Distribution at McGill University and a Professor in Food Distribution and Policy in the Faculty of Management at Dalhousie University in Halifax. He is also the Senior Director of the Agri-food Analytics Lab, also located at Dalhousie University.
Known as “The Food Professor”, his current research interest lies in the broad area of food distribution, security and safety. He is one of the world’s most cited scholars in food supply chain management, food value chains and traceability with over 775 published peer-reviewed journal articles. Dr. Charlebois is also an editor for the prestigious Trends in Food Science Technology journal.
He co-hosts The Food Professor podcast, discussing issues in the food, foodservice, grocery and restaurant industries and which is the most listened Canadian management podcast in Canada.
Every year since 2012, he has published the now highly anticipated Canadian Food Price Report, which provides an overview of food price trends for the coming year. Furthermore, his research has been featured in several newspapers and media groups, nationally as well as internationally. He has testified on several occasions before parliamentary committees on food policy-related issues as an expert witness. He has been asked to act as an advisor on food and agricultural policies in many Canadian provinces and other countries.
With extensive experience collaborating with businesses, governments, and NGOs, Dr. Charlebois combines academic rigor with practical expertise, making him one of the most influential voices in the global agri-food landscape. His work continues to advance the understanding of food systems, fostering innovation and resilience in a rapidly evolving industry. In 2025, he received the prestigious Charles III medal recognizing his tremendous work in informing Canadians about food issues.
Michael LeBlanc is a senior retail advisor, keynote speaker and media entrepreneur. Michael has delivered keynotes, hosted fire-side discussions hosted senior retail executive on-stage in 1:1 interviews worldwide. Michael produces and hosts a network of leading retail trade podcasts, including The Remarkable Retail Podcast, The Voice of Retail, The Food Professor, The FEED powered by Loblaw and the Global eCommerce Leaders podcast. He has been recognized by the National Retail Federation (NRF) as a global Top Retail Voice for 2025 and 2025, and continues to be a ReThink Retail Top Retail Expert for the fifth year in a row.

Murad built AGT on one bet: that Prairie farmers would replace summer fallow with lentils, chickpeas, peas and beans. The company now runs 41 manufacturing facilities on five continents, with Prem Watsa’s Fairfax Financial as its partner. He makes the case for adding value to even a fraction of Canada’s harvest, for fixing east-west trade infrastructure from Churchill to the Atlantic Gateway, and for a real industrial strategy.
In the news
Canadian Food Sentiment Index: The fifth edition finds coupon use down from 30.5% to 20.3% as shoppers settle on private label. Omnivores have fallen to 56.7% of Canadians, and GLP-1 use could reach five million by 2030.
HungerCount 2026: Food Banks Canada reports 2.35 million visits a month. B.C. posted the largest increase at 14%, and children make up a third of those served.
Quebec maple syrup: The province’s strategic reserve is empty. Demand is outpacing supply, and new production is held back by the cost of equipment and the wait for it.
Plus: an egg-plant lockout in Quebec and the Save-On-Foods loyalty-program breach and France grocery cyber-attack.
Topics include:
AGT Foods and the protein revolution
Canada–India trade and agri-food exports
Value-added food processing and industrial strategy
Food insecurity and food bank use

Join us at the Coffee Association of Canada's Annual Conference Thursday, November 12th, 2026
at Angus Glen in Toronto (Markham)

Are you ready for the Next Wave? Get Your Tickets Here

This year’s conference will bring together leaders from across the industry for a day of bold conversations, market insights, networking and inspiration, focused on the ideas, people and innovations shaping the future of coffee in Canada.

Don’t miss Canada’s premier coffee industry event — we sell out every year!

About Us
Dr. Sylvain Charlebois is a Visiting Professor in Food Policy and Distribution at McGill University and a Professor in Food Distribution and Policy in the Faculty of Management at Dalhousie University in Halifax. He is also the Senior Director of the Agri-food Analytics Lab, also located at Dalhousie University.
Known as “The Food Professor”, his current research interest lies in the broad area of food distribution, security and safety. He is one of the world’s most cited scholars in food supply chain management, food value chains and traceability with over 775 published peer-reviewed journal articles. Dr. Charlebois is also an editor for the prestigious Trends in Food Science Technology journal.
He co-hosts The Food Professor podcast, discussing issues in the food, foodservice, grocery and restaurant industries and which is the most listened Canadian management podcast in Canada.
Every year since 2012, he has published the now highly anticipated Canadian Food Price Report, which provides an overview of food price trends for the coming year. Furthermore, his research has been featured in several newspapers and media groups, nationally as well as internationally. He has testified on several occasions before parliamentary committees on food policy-related issues as an expert witness. He has been asked to act as an advisor on food and agricultural policies in many Canadian provinces and other countries.
With extensive experience collaborating with businesses, governments, and NGOs, Dr. Charlebois combines academic rigor with practical expertise, making him one of the most influential voices in the global agri-food landscape. His work continues to advance the understanding of food systems, fostering innovation and resilience in a rapidly evolving industry. In 2025, he received the prestigious Charles III medal recognizing his tremendous work in informing Canadians about food issues.
Michael LeBlanc is a senior retail advisor, keynote speaker and media entrepreneur. Michael has delivered keynotes, hosted fire-side discussions hosted senior retail executive on-stage in 1:1 interviews worldwide. Michael produces and hosts a network of leading retail trade podcasts, including The Remarkable Retail Podcast, The Voice of Retail, The Food Professor, The FEED powered by Loblaw and the Global eCommerce Leaders podcast. He has been recognized by the National Retail Federation (NRF) as a global Top Retail Voice for 2025 and 2025, and continues to be a ReThink Retail Top Retail Expert for the fifth year in a row.

Vin explains why Canada’s heavy reliance on trade with the U.S. and Mexico leaves fresh produce, seafood and imported proteins most at risk. He also looks at why 89% of Canadian organizations report raw-material scarcity, compared with 67% in the U.S., and why the nine-to-12-month stockpiles many companies built to ride out tariffs are reaching a tipping point.
He makes the case for counter-seasonal sourcing from the Southern Hemisphere and AI-driven inventory intelligence, and for treating the supply chain as a business-continuity asset rather than a cost centre.
Before the interview, Michael and Sylvain preview the third annual MNP Food and Beverage Business Outlook. Canada ranks seventh in the G20, and Sylvain names the one lever he’d pull to move it into the top five. They also cover McCain’s expansion in India, Taylor Farms pausing Mexican sourcing, an oversupplied global wine market, rising banana prices and Italy as country of honour at SIAL Canada and Michael raves about Pirates of Coffee in advance of the Coffee Association of Canada's upcoming conferenc Thursday, November 12th, 2026
Topics include:
Canadian grocery supply chain resilience
Capgemini World in Balance 2026 study
Inventory buffers and raw-material scarcity
MNP Food and Beverage Business Outlook G20 rankings
Canada–India agri-food trade
Banana prices, diesel and monoculture risk

Join us at the Coffee Association of Canada's Annual Conference Thursday, November 12th, 2026
at Angus Glen in Toronto (Markham)

Are you ready for the Next Wave? Get Your Tickets Here

This year’s conference will bring together leaders from across the industry for a day of bold conversations, market insights, networking and inspiration, focused on the ideas, people and innovations shaping the future of coffee in Canada.

Don’t miss Canada’s premier coffee industry event — we sell out every year!

About Us
Dr. Sylvain Charlebois is a Visiting Professor in Food Policy and Distribution at McGill University and a Professor in Food Distribution and Policy in the Faculty of Management at Dalhousie University in Halifax. He is also the Senior Director of the Agri-food Analytics Lab, also located at Dalhousie University.
Known as “The Food Professor”, his current research interest lies in the broad area of food distribution, security and safety. He is one of the world’s most cited scholars in food supply chain management, food value chains and traceability with over 775 published peer-reviewed journal articles. Dr. Charlebois is also an editor for the prestigious Trends in Food Science Technology journal.
He co-hosts The Food Professor podcast, discussing issues in the food, foodservice, grocery and restaurant industries and which is the most listened Canadian management podcast in Canada.
Every year since 2012, he has published the now highly anticipated Canadian Food Price Report, which provides an overview of food price trends for the coming year. Furthermore, his research has been featured in several newspapers and media groups, nationally as well as internationally. He has testified on several occasions before parliamentary committees on food policy-related issues as an expert witness. He has been asked to act as an advisor on food and agricultural policies in many Canadian provinces and other countries.
With extensive experience collaborating with businesses, governments, and NGOs, Dr. Charlebois combines academic rigor with practical expertise, making him one of the most influential voices in the global agri-food landscape. His work continues to advance the understanding of food systems, fostering innovation and resilience in a rapidly evolving industry. In 2025, he received the prestigious Charles III medal recognizing his tremendous work in informing Canadians about food issues.
Michael LeBlanc is a senior retail advisor, keynote speaker and media entrepreneur. Michael has delivered keynotes, hosted fire-side discussions hosted senior retail executive on-stage in 1:1 interviews worldwide. Michael produces and hosts a network of leading retail trade podcasts, including The Remarkable Retail Podcast, The Voice of Retail, The Food Professor, The FEED powered by Loblaw and the Global eCommerce Leaders podcast. He has been recognized by the National Retail Federation (NRF) as a global Top Retail Voice for 2025 and 2025, and continues to be a ReThink Retail Top Retail Expert for the fifth year in a row.

WfE stands for Whisky for Everyone. Unlike most young distilleries, it makes no gin or vodka to pay the bills while its own spirit ages. Instead, the team buys aged Canadian whisky in bulk, re-ages and blends it, then finishes it in ice cider casks to create an approachable "onboarding" whisky. They also cover SAQ listings, rising bottle and cask costs, ready-to-serve cocktails, and the liquor-board rules that keep craft distillers from shipping across provincial lines.
In the news, Sylvain sizes up the Parti Québécois's sweeping election win, its pledge to source 75% of public-institution food from Quebec, and his shortlist for agriculture minister. New Statistics Canada data show agri-food exports to the U.S. up 5.8% and America's share of our imports edging higher. Is the "elbows up" boycott showing up anywhere? Michael asks whether restaurant diners can even choose.
Plus: Nortera steps back from Green Giant, JBS closes Wild Fork, the Westons move on Boots, the U.S. molasses ban and a Goodles taste test.
Topics include:
Quebec craft whisky
Interprovincial trade barriers
Quebec election and agriculture
Canada–U.S. agri-food trade
Surveillance pricing

Join us at the Coffee Association of Canada's Annual Conference Thursday, November 12th, 2026
at Angus Glen in Toronto (Markham)

Are you ready for the Next Wave? Get Your Tickets Here

This year’s conference will bring together leaders from across the industry for a day of bold conversations, market insights, networking and inspiration, focused on the ideas, people and innovations shaping the future of coffee in Canada.

Don’t miss Canada’s premier coffee industry event — we sell out every year!

About Us
Dr. Sylvain Charlebois is a Visiting Professor in Food Policy and Distribution at McGill University and a Professor in Food Distribution and Policy in the Faculty of Management at Dalhousie University in Halifax. He is also the Senior Director of the Agri-food Analytics Lab, also located at Dalhousie University.
Known as “The Food Professor”, his current research interest lies in the broad area of food distribution, security and safety. He is one of the world’s most cited scholars in food supply chain management, food value chains and traceability with over 775 published peer-reviewed journal articles. Dr. Charlebois is also an editor for the prestigious Trends in Food Science Technology journal.
He co-hosts The Food Professor podcast, discussing issues in the food, foodservice, grocery and restaurant industries and which is the most listened Canadian management podcast in Canada.
Every year since 2012, he has published the now highly anticipated Canadian Food Price Report, which provides an overview of food price trends for the coming year. Furthermore, his research has been featured in several newspapers and media groups, nationally as well as internationally. He has testified on several occasions before parliamentary committees on food policy-related issues as an expert witness. He has been asked to act as an advisor on food and agricultural policies in many Canadian provinces and other countries.
With extensive experience collaborating with businesses, governments, and NGOs, Dr. Charlebois combines academic rigor with practical expertise, making him one of the most influential voices in the global agri-food landscape. His work continues to advance the understanding of food systems, fostering innovation and resilience in a rapidly evolving industry. In 2025, he received the prestigious Charles III medal recognizing his tremendous work in informing Canadians about food issues.
Michael LeBlanc is a senior retail advisor, keynote speaker and media entrepreneur. Michael has delivered keynotes, hosted fire-side discussions hosted senior retail executive on-stage in 1:1 interviews worldwide. Michael produces and hosts a network of leading retail trade podcasts, including The Remarkable Retail Podcast, The Voice of Retail, The Food Professor, The FEED powered by Loblaw and the Global eCommerce Leaders podcast. He has been recognized by the National Retail Federation (NRF) as a global Top Retail Voice for 2025 and 2025, and continues to be a ReThink Retail Top Retail Expert for the fifth year in a row.