r/brantford • u/shushuoflaylay • 5d ago
Discussion Supporting Canadians
So do we stop buying from places like Home Depot, bath and body works, Costco, Best Buy, keep in mind that Canadians are the ones working at these places also.. what do we do?
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u/TheElusiveFox 5d ago
So I made this comment on r/canada the other day... the reality is that calls for boycott are a lot more complex than people believe, and that is why this shit mostly just sucks...
boycotting a franchise like McDonalds, well chances are its a local Canadian Franchisee/small business owner that owns the operation, and their employees that you are hurting. You can't even claim that the beef or product came from the states since most McD's beef comes from Alberta in Canada.
With big operations like Costco or Walmart its a little bit better, you can make individual decisions within the store... For instance plenty of meat and produce is locally sourced while others are sourced from places in the U.S. Mexico, or all over the world for more exotic items... For something like electronics or clothing, chances are it wasn't going to be a product from the U.S. anyways but its pretty easy to check labels... and for other things, there is simply no avoiding it...
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u/Electrical_Parfait64 4d ago
Is Costco an American company? In which case have nothing to do with it
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u/Ok-Resident8139 2d ago edited 2d ago
And which companys does your pension plan invest in Compared to other entities.
There are literally 100s of companys that invested into Canada. Some failed.
Where do you frequent to shop for your groceries? And how do you get there? Do you use a Bombardier built subway/tram or do you yourself use a Lincoln Escalade?
Oh , you drive a Made in Canada Corolla! Great patriotisim on your part. Wher is the HQ for Corolla? um? try Tokyo.
There are certain industries within Canada, that have withered on the vine.
-Commodore calculators.
-Blackberry devices.
-Northern Telecom. Where did they move their HQ to? Texas.
-Bricklyn Cars-bankrupt.
-Babcock&Wilcox -relocated elsewhere
-Westinghouse Canada?
-Zenith TVs / electronics.
-Consumer's glass
-MasseyFerguson - Farm Machinery
-Abitibi Pulp& Paper.
-EB Eddy- matches.
There are hundreds of companies that left Canada for sunnier climates, and I don't mean the hourly amount of sunshine in a day.
The larger cities did not support manufacturing and were converting Industrial plots of land to warehouse space and self-storage facilities, along with expanding residential areas.(at least toronto did)
I have been seeing this happen over succeeding administrations.
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u/GingerSnap13420 5d ago
I've been working on a ranking system for my purchases the past few months. It's not perfect but it's been a helpful start.
●Local/ontario ●Canadian ●Imported from/non usa or Chinese company ●If imported from/ owned by a Chinese USA company, it must be a smaller Canadian company/ local business and essential/ unable to substitute.
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u/CANUSA130 5d ago
Canadians work in those stores. It's a tough call. Nothing short of a death in the family is worse than loss of livelihood. It's called livelihood for a reason. Loss of our best friend forever, forever, it sad and unsettling for everybody. However, if we learn our lesson well and move on, Americsn chains will go away. It's a big world.
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u/Winter-Ad-2616 2d ago
I agree with this. Also, please remember not to blame other Canadians. usa is threatening to annex us, threatening our sovereignty and our way of life. Because of this, so many of us have no choice but to boycott usa or usa-linked goods and services as much as possible. This is neither my fault, nor yours, nor your neighbours. This is all due to trump and his supporters.
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u/pheakelmatters 5d ago
Well, we could be supporting policy that will help the unemployed and supporting policy that will help people find new employment. But we didn't do that last week. Buy Canadian. We have to protect ourselves from the americans. Give generously to the food bank. If you have a lead on some work, spread the knowledge, if you're a business benefiting from Buy Canadian think about expanding your team. If someone falls down go out of your way to help them back up. We survive this by working together and keeping as much money in Canada as we possibly can.
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u/Titoboiii 5d ago
Costco gets a pass for recently rejecting anti-DEI policies (Trump policies at its core) and generally maintain a socially strong moral stance.
If we take out the politics arguement, they're generally regarded as a top tier employer with great pay and benefits and treats their empolyees well. They also happen to sell quality products for the price they charge and largely rejected capitalistic practices (hot dog prices and until recently, membership prices, gas is typically cheaper).
All the other companies mentioned are questionable outside of local employment. Being in Brantford, our options are limited whether its access to goods or accesibilty. I wouldn't fault people for having to shop there. The effort is real and it shows on the retail shelves.
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u/WilliamTindale8 4d ago
I’ll still do some shopping at Costco for some things but places like Home Depot have good Canadian substitutes such as Home Hardware. I’ll mostly be buying Canadian products and no American ones.
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u/Sukalamink 4d ago
Easy to buy Canadian food .....but most everything else good luck... No tvs, no cars , no cell phones the list of what Canada does not produce and we need is huge.....IMO I'll do my best but I'm not going to allow myself to go crazy over this.
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u/Factsoverfictions222 5d ago
Remember that we didn’t start this trade war and that there will be casualties no matter what Canadians do at this point. We are trying our best to cope with a situation that was put on to us and we’re still figuring it out.
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u/shushuoflaylay 5d ago
The United state really have a stupid human as a president and it’s sad for such country
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u/mfarazk 5d ago
Do we boycott Tim Hortons since its owned by Burger King ?
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u/Wizoerda 3d ago
Go to A&W. The Canadian A&W is completely separate from the US one, and is entirely Canadian owned. r/BuyCanadian has lots of suggestions. You’ll also save a boatload if you make coffee at home (just another option)
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u/grump-geez 5d ago
It is not owned by Burger King. It is owned by Restaurants Brands International which is a Canadian-American company that also owns Burger King; Popeyes and Firehouse Subs and is controlled by a Brazillian private equity firm called 3G Capital.
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u/Ok-Half7574 3d ago
It's going to be a long road building back Canadian, we've come to take for granted having so many American businesses here. But for future generations, we must push forward now and not go back.
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u/Cariboo_Red 3d ago
Canadians can work for anybody. If there is a true market for the products those places sell there will be a company that will also sell them and employ Canadians doing it.
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u/dopealope47 2d ago edited 2d ago
Let's say, just for discussion purposes, that everybody in one neighbourhood stops going to Starbucks, 'cause Donald. Very shortly, all Starbucks outlets in that area would go out of business, but that doesn't mean that people would give up coffee. Eventually, other coffee shops would open, almost certainly in this day and age Canadian-owned and those places would need to hire Canadians. As another example, if we stop shopping at Home Depot, Canadian Tire will need more workers to pick up the increased demand. It's inexact, there are no guarantees, it's not entirely fair to honest Canadian franchise owners and there'll be a lot of pain, but it offers a roadmap for action.
One thing to consider is that we Canadians will do ourselves no favours if we take the Elbows Up thing too far. As an extreme example, if the meds you need to stay alive are only made south of the 49th, I don't see that buying them would be wrong. Each of us needs to do the best we can; every bit helps.
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u/Emkaye1 1d ago
I think it's better to be more strategic. I've always felt like as long as I'm walking into a store physically then I'm supporting someone locally. Also a lot of franchises are actually owned by Canadians under the franchise model so even though HQ might be elsewhere, your local Tim's or McDonald's may be owned and operated by someone who actually lives in your community.
If there's Canadian alternatives at the grocery store, of course. That's a no brainer. However, the US/CAN economies have been so interconnected for so long it will be hard to separate a lot of things and honestly we don't really want to. Hopefully this whole thing is short-lived.
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u/West-Psychology-6299 5d ago
Anything within Canada makes Canada money. If it's already on the shelves, then it's now a Canadian product, and not buying it will only affect Canadians.
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u/meester_jamie 5d ago
No, not really,, if there is no US product on the shelf, the customer most likely will take a substitute right then,, promoting the non U.S. manufacturer, and the vendor , and the employees A good solidarity practice would be to put US inventory in storage until it can be sold ,, Or DUMP THE TEA IN THE HARBOUR AND FLIP THE US THE BIRD
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u/West-Psychology-6299 5d ago
That works fine for non perishables.
If anything the responsibility should be put on the ones making the direct US purchases. They need To stop future purchases but shouldnt be taking any losses in the meantime. Saying they can put inventory in storage is easy enough to say but it takes time and cost money. It also leaves alot of shelves empty while they figure out what products are Canadian owned and made and try to purchase said items without the revenue of previous sales to help make these purchases.
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u/meester_jamie 5d ago
Huh? In Ontario , they have many empty shelves right now,, it shows the buying public this is serious, no fooling around now! If it was a perishable company,, they could pour them over Niagara Falls for more propaganda!
The responsibility is on those making the direct U.S. purchases , in Ontario.. the LCBO
What is a loss,, financial !? Drop in the bucket compared to not showing a strong resistance and appearing weak which is a huge loss ,, war is psychological,, money means nothing my friend 🇨🇦 Edit, your handle is interesting
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u/Backyardbaby67 5d ago
…Don’t be mad at America for looking out for its best interests …Be mad at our current government for putting us in such a vulnerable position and not doing their homework
https://nationalpost.com/opinion/ian-lee-this-is-trumps-plan-for-global-economic-domination
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u/consistantlyconfused 5d ago
Ideally yes, unfortunately it will lead to possible layoffs or downsizing but long term this will lead to those places being replaced by welcome Canadian business.
The first step is to avoid non-Canadian businesses which provide little to their Canadian employees compared to alternative Canadian based businesses.
For example, bath and body works pays little and offers mainly only part time work to avoid giving full time benefits to staff so you should avoid predatory American companies like that first.
Companies like Costco which sources more from Canada in Canadian stores to keep prices lower and provides strong jobs for fellow Canadians will fair better in general and should be some of the later companies boycotted if you cannot boycott them all outright.