Maple Leaf picks Ontario city for its new DC

Toronto – A city in Ontario has been selected for Maple Leaf Foods Inc. new distribution centre (DC).

The new DC will be located in Puslinch Township in the County of Wellington and is expected to create 80 jobs once it’s up and running.

The 282,000 sq.-ft. facility will operate as the company’s prepared meats distribution hub for Central and Eastern Canada. Maple Leaf selected DB Schenker as its third-party logistics provider with responsibility for its operations.

The facility will combine ambient, refrigerated and frozen products into one site. Maple Leaf says the DC will be built and owned by a third-party investor and leased by the company.

The DC’s location means it’s also close to Maple Leaf’s eastern prepared meats facilities including the 402,000 sq.-ft. facility currently under construction in Hamilton, Ont.

Michael McCain, president and CEO of Maple Leaf, says the DC is part of the company’s value creation plan, which it announced in late 2011. “This new facility will simplify our distribution network and significantly increase our supply chain efficiencies,” he says.

Maple Leaf says the company will now proceed with the appropriate regulatory approvals with construction expected to start this spring.

The company is expected to begin operations at the DC in 2013, reports the GuelphMercury.com. The new centre will replace distribution centres in Kitchener, Burlington and Moncton by 2014.

Those closings were outlined in 2011 as the company announced significant changes in modernizing its prepared meats business.

A new plant is being built in Hamilton. The Schneiders plant in Kitchener and existing plants in Hamilton, Toronto, Moncton, Winnipeg and North Battleford, Sask., are on the chopping block.