Outmigration
P.E.I. hot sauce company looks to the west for growth opportunities

EMIEL LEBLANC’S hot sauce flavours are a hit in the friendly confines of Eastern Canada.

But how can his small business (he says he has “one-and-a-half” employees besides himself) located in rural P.E.I. get to the next level? Leblanc says a key piece of the puzzle is finding a way to get his hot sauces to Western Canada without it costing an arm and a leg. “Shipping costs are a limiting factor,” admits Leblanc, who started Maritime Madness Inc. in his hometown of Cardigan in 2008.

If Leblanc can solve his shipping cost quandary, Maritime Madness could go from being a niche business to one that’s a household name. While the business sells other items, such as P.E.I.-made maple syrup, honey and jelly, it’s the hot sauces that are its signature product–made (mostly) from peppers grown on the island.

Maritime Madness has tapped into a market of food lovers who are looking for something different besides the typical hot sauces to spice up their meals. Leblanc’s sauces can be found at 72 Sobeys stores across Atlantic Canada, although they are sold under “Miracle Sauce” brand. He says they are also found at retail outlets in every province except Manitoba.

However, his reach in Western Canada is limited to a handful of stores. He would like to change that. One option is to subcontract production to someone in the West. But his preferred solution is finding a Western Canada-based distributor that can get Maritime Madness products in more stores west of Ontario. “We could send the products to them and then they could ship orders from Western Canada,” Leblanc says. “The more locations we are at, the more customers we can get.”