Episode 75: Contract Manufacturing with Preet Bhullar, COO and Co-Founder of Blue Ocean Group

In this episode, we sit down with Alice Couderc, co-founder of Atome Bakery, a Vancouver-based French-inspired bakery creating ready-to-bake frozen artisan breads and pastries. Alice moved from France to Canada in 2018, while her co-founder, Lucas Navilloz, found himself seriously missing French bread. So he started making his own. What began as a personal solution evolved into Atome Bakery, built around a simple idea: make artisan-style bread more accessible to people who do not live near an artisan bakery. Instead of opening a traditional storefront, Alice and Lucas built a direct-to-consumer frozen model and have since expanded across Canada. Along the way, they also became experts in something most bakeries never expect to tackle: frozen logistics. After launching in the U.S. in early 2025, trade uncertainty pushed the team to pivot their growth strategy back toward Canada, expanding into Ontario and Quebec. That pivot also uncovered a new opportunity: helping other frozen food brands fulfill direct-to-consumer orders. Throughout the conversation, we explore: Turning a personal pain point into a scalable food business

We chat with Parry Aftab, agrifood community builder and founder of PEI Food Strong, Canadian Source to Supper, and PEI Good Eats, to explore how community, local food and practical action can help build a more resilient food system. Parry spent decades as a lawyer specializing in cyberlaw, cybersecurity and online safety, working with organizations and governments around the world. Then COVID changed the trajectory. She and her husband moved to Prince Edward Island and Parry did what any self-described food lover does: she started a Facebook food group. This community has since grown to more than 23,000 members and became the catalyst for something much bigger. Through PEI Food Strong, Parry is now focused on helping the Island retain more of the value created by the food it grows, catches and produces. That means looking at local processing, manufacturing, entrepreneurship and new uses for ingredients that might otherwise go to waste. Seaweed can become skin care or pet supplements. Lobster shells can become fertilizer. Rescued food can be transformed into shelf-stable products. Parry calls it “putting waste to work.” Community remains central to everything she is building. Today, Parry is building a network of initiatives designed to make PEI’s food system more resilient, connected and locally driven. Throughout the conversation, we also explore: Why PEI needs more local processing and value-added manufacturing How rescued food and by-products can become new opportunities Why affordability must be part of the conversation around buying local The importance of supporting emerging food entrepreneurs How community knowledge can help drive food innovation Why collaboration needs to move beyond “elbows up” to “linking elbows” Parry will bring this systems-thinking approach to the Food Forward Summit on October 8 in Mississauga, where she will moderate a discussion on interprovincial food trade barriers and the challenges producers and processors face when moving food across Canada. For Parry, stronger food systems are not built by one organization, one company or one level of government. They are built by bringing people together, listening to the expertise already in the room and turning conversation into action. As she puts it, when the people in the audience are just as knowledgeable as the people on the stage, that is when things happen. We also talk butter tarts, PEI’s future official cookie, Johnny Cakes and whether lobster belongs in dessert. This is a conversation about food and what happens when people stop waiting for someone else to fix the system, bring their own superpowers to the table and start building something together. Not just elbows up; linking elbows. Resourceshttps://www.peifoodstrong.com/program https://www.sourcetosupper.comhttps://www.peicooks.com https://www.foodforwardsummit.com/agenda

What if tackling one of the world’s biggest micronutrient challenges started with something as simple as what goes into the cooking pot? In this episode, we sit down with Dr. Gavin Armstrong, founder and CEO of Lucky Iron Life, to explore the science, social impact and the journey behind Lucky Iron Fish. Gavin entered university planning to pursue finance before an interdisciplinary course took him to Botswana and completely changed the direction of his career. That experience eventually led him into international development, refugee camps in Kenya, and a growing awareness of what is often called “hidden hunger”, where people may consume enough calories but still lack essential micronutrients. What was supposed to be a two-week visit in Cambodia became three years and a PhD focused on iron deficiency and the concept that would become the Lucky Iron Fish. The idea is deceptively simple. Place the reusable iron cooking tool into boiling liquid with a little acidity for approximately 10 minutes, and it releases iron into the food. Gavin explains that the product uses electrolytic iron commonly used in food fortification and was developed to provide an accessible alternative for households dealing with iron deficiency. The science was only one part of the challenge. The original product was an iron disc. Technically, it worked. Culturally, it did not. Women in Cambodia told the research team it looked like something picked up from the side of the road. Through community research, they learned that fish symbolize luck in Cambodian culture. The disc became a fish, and something people were reluctant to put in their cooking pot became something they actively wanted to use. Later, when the company expanded into India, the fish shape created another adoption barrier within vegetarian communities. The team adapted again, developing a tulsi leaf version. It is a great reminder that innovation is not only about whether something works. It also has to work for the people expected to use it. Throughout the conversation, we also explore: The importance of independent clinical validation when commercializing a health innovation

In this episode, we sit down with Mehnaz Tabassum, CEO of NL Eats and Food Forward Summit, to talk about the journey from building an online food community to launching a nonprofit and creating a national platform bringing together people across Canada's food system. Mehnaz shares how NL Eats evolved from a grassroots community into an organization focused on food access, connection and systems-level change, and how that work ultimately shaped the vision for the Food Forward Summit. This vision is now growing into a three-stop 2026 circuit, beginning with Food Forward Atlantic in St. John's on September 23, followed by Food Forward on the Hill in Ottawa on October 6, and culminating in the Food Forward Summit at The International Centre in Mississauga on October 8. We talk about what it takes to grow an idea from community conversation into a national event, the importance of creating spaces where different parts of the food system can actually meet, and why meaningful change requires bringing more voices to the same table. Mehnaz also previews what attendees can expect on October 8, including three theatres focused on Leadership, Innovation and Community, alongside keynotes, workshops and exhibitors. The program brings together producers, innovators, investors, policymakers, CPG companies, buyers, distributors and international partners, with conversations spanning food systems innovation, AI, global trade, food policy, food security and Indigenous food sovereignty. A particularly interesting part of the Summit is the Innovation Challenge. Participants can choose between two streams, Blue Food Systems or Sustainable Agrifood, with finalists receiving mentorship, scale-up support and the opportunity to pitch live at the Summit. As Mehnaz explains, the bigger exercise goes beyond simply finding the winning solution. It is about learning how to approach a complex food-system problem through the lens of innovation. How do you define the problem? Who needs to be part of the conversation? What assumptions need to be challenged? And how do you move from an interesting idea toward something that can actually create impact? That mindset runs through the broader Food Forward vision: bringing different perspectives together, asking better questions and creating the conditions for ideas to move into action. If you want to continue the conversation in person, the Food Forward Summit takes place October 8, 2026 at The International Centre in Mississauga.

We are on site in Coquitlam, BC with Shaun Ashworth, Co-Founder, Owner, and President of Associated Labels and Packaging. Shaun takes us behind the scenes of their packaging operations and shares why great packaging is about so much more than what we see on the shelf.