Canadian Business

I grew up an only child in Florida, raised by a single mom who ran a party gift business. She transformed people’s visions into beautifully decorated spaces with balloons and flowers—she loved making people happy. But from a young age, I also saw how hard it was to run a business. We didn’t take trips because she often worked on holidays and weekends. That upbringing taught me nothing would be handed to me. If I wanted to succeed, I’d have to earn it.

Dominique Ritter Dominique Ritter is a writer whose work has been published by the Toronto Star, CTV, Cottage Life and the Nature Conservancy of Canada. She was previously an editor at Reader’s Digest, the Canadian Encyclopedia, Adbusters and magazines for Investors Group, Fairmont Hotels & Resorts and Air Canada.

The Canadian Business Innovation Awards returned for its fifth edition on April 23 at the Toronto Region Board of Trade to celebrate Canada’s most forward-thinking leaders. Set against sweeping waterfront views, the event recognized innovators who are redefining industries and helping shape the country’s future.

In the last year, uncertainty has become a certainty for Canadian companies. Trade tensions with the U.S. and disruptions to global supply chains have affected manufacturers, exporters, and retailers alike, while the rapid rise of AI has pushed businesses to rethink how they operate and engage customers. As these pressures reshape the economy, forward-looking companies are forging ahead with bold initiatives to thrive in an unpredictable environment.

Ideas Reddit is becoming a first stop for online information. Instead of relying on search summaries or brand messaging, users are turning to the platform for unfiltered, community-driven discussion. For brands, this shift represents a growing opportunity to reach consumers at the point where opinions are formed. Colin James Belyea, the co-founder of Karmic, a Reddit-focused growth marketing agency based in New Brunswick, says he noticed this shift while researching a topic for work.

From left: Stephanie Vachon, Gino DiGioacchino, Rick Fitzgerald, Kishanth Kumaraswamy. {Photography: Carmen Cheung} A lot has changed since Gordon Reid opened his first Giant Tiger store in Ottawa 65 years ago. But if you step into one of the hundreds of stores now operating across Canada, you’ll find that the most important things haven’t changed.

Ideas After more than a decade working with founders, one thing is clear to me: immigrant entrepreneurs don’t come to take from Canada’s economy–they come to build it. As CEO and founder of Global Startups, a Toronto-based strategic growth partner, and as a general partner at GSA Ventures, a venture capital firm focused on immigrant-led and globally diverse entrepreneurial teams, I’ve supported more than 340 startups across Canada and internationally.

As business travel continues to rebound, many companies are rethinking how they manage it. While digital booking tools have made it easier to plan trips, they can fall short when travel becomes more complex, something industries like construction, mining, oil and energy, and others know all too well. For these industries, travel isn’t occasional. It’s constant, often involving tight timelines, remote destinations and frequent last-minute changes. And when something goes wrong, the stakes are high.

When Scott Currie jogs with run clubs, he isn’t just exercising—he’s doing business. In 2023, the 34-year-old was midway through a marathon when a cramp ripped through his left hamstring. Later that year, another spasm ruined yet another race. In the weeks that followed, he started researching supplements and electrolytes to understand why it kept happening. He learned that the average runner loses 800 mg of sodium per hour of exercise, but he was only replacing a quarter of that.

{Photography: Organic Traditions} In both small neighbourhood health food stores and larger retail chains, shoppers keep returning to Organic Traditions’ superfood blends. The sachets contain ingredients like  cacao from Peru, spices from India, and matcha from Japan. Still, inside the Toronto-based consumer-packaged goods (CPG) company known for its nutrient-dense, plant-based products, there was a nagging sense that its growth strategy was falling short.