Made for Local founder Sheena Russell started the business as a side hustle in 2012. Today, Made with Local products are sold in 3,500 locations across Canada, including Costco, Walmart, Fresh St. Market, Sobeys, Loblaws and London Drugs.Supplied
A post-pandemic warehouse purchase changed everything for protein bar company Made with Local, catapulting its expansion from a local delicacy to a national contender in the highly competitive snack food industry.
“Coming into this building …felt like fate or serendipity,” says Made with Local founder and chief executive officer Sheena Russell, who got an offer to buy the space from its previous owner in 2022.
“Immediately I was like, ‘yes’ because I had had these passing thoughts so many times over the years that if we could ever get that building that they were in, that could be a good home for us.”
The move to a larger space came a decade after Ms. Russell founded the Windsor, N.S.-based company as a side hustle to her job with the City of Halifax, teaching businesses how to recycle.
She says the previous work experience provided her with a “deep learning period about product-market fit, how to make the product as delicious as it could be, at the right price point and build out the brand. It never, ever crossed my mind that I was going to become an entrepreneur.”
Leaning into Canada
With rising costs, fierce competition and shrinking trade with the U.S., smaller brands are having to rethink how they show up in the market. For Made with Local, this meant doubling down on domestic production and leaning into its dedication to sourcing local products to set itself apart. Modernizing production to meet the demands of larger retailers has also led to its success to date.
Today, Made with Local products are sold in 3,500 locations across Canada, including Costco, Walmart, Fresh St. Market, Sobeys, Loblaws and London Drugs.
Scaling from local producer to household name is a challenge for smaller food companies in Canada, explains David Soberman, a professor of marketing at the University of Toronto’s Rotman School of Management.
“One issue is the tremendous fixed investment needed to produce the quantities required for national distribution,” he says. “The second challenge is getting that distribution in the first place, because smaller producers typically don’t have the sales networks [or relationships] with major retailers.”
Even so, Canadian brands that emphasize local production can carve out a loyal customer base despite higher prices, he says, particularly as consumers increasingly look to support domestic companies.
“There’s always a fraction of the market that wants higher-quality products made locally,” says Prof. Soberman, who advises companies that want to make this a central part of their marketing to ensure that customers can easily find where their products are sold on their websites. “The Buy Canadian movement has been highly documented and there are many consumers willing to pay a little extra to support local businesses.”
Made with Local has leaned into that message, prioritizing Canadian ingredients wherever possible. The company sources large quantities of Canadian organic honey, for example, working directly with beekeepers rather than buying through multiple layers of distributors.
Ms. Russell says those direct relationships have strengthened the company’s supply chain during turbulent years.
“We’ve just been able to lock in our supply chain much more confidently by working really close to the source,” she says.
The adjustments come amid a rapid growth in the snack food category. The Canadian snacks market generated $12.7-billion in revenue in 2025 and is expected to grow by nearly 6 per cent annually through 2030, according to research platform Statista.
Healthy snack bars, in particular, have surged in popularity as consumers look for “convenience and the search for quick protein fixes,” says Sylvain Charlebois, senior director of the Agri-Food Analytics Lab at Dalhousie University in Halifax.
These buyers might also be more willing to open their wallets as “a consumer looking for a food solution like Made with Local is not as price sensitive because it almost represents a meal for some,” he explains.
Technology and diversification helped drive growth
Since purchasing and renovating its almost 750-square-metre warehouse space in 2022, Made with Local has transitioned to a fully automated bar line, meaning dough enters one end of the production system and finished snack bars emerge from the other. Owning its own manufacturing has allowed the company to improve efficiency while keeping production in Canada.
The company has also diversified its sales strategy to reduce risk. In addition to grocery retailers, the company sells through direct-to-consumer channels, institutions such as universities and office programs.
“It’s a really bad idea for any … food brand startup to have all your eggs in one basket,” Ms. Russell explains.
By diversifying its channels, Made with Local also absorbed much of the shock from uncertainty in U.S. cross-border trade, leading the company to scale back its U.S. distribution. For now, the company is focusing much of its growth strategy on Canada rather than aggressively expanding abroad.
“Anywhere in this country that you see a Clif Bar, it should be a Made with Local bar instead of or as well,” says Ms. Russell, noting that there’s room for her company to grow. “I feel very bullish about Made with Local because there’s still so much low-hanging fruit for us.”