VersaCold Blog

Versacold logistics services. Click on the links below to login to our customer interface. Carrier Portal Login. If you are a Carrier, click on the link below to login to our provider interface. VersaCold eNews Sign Up. Be sure to join VersaCold eNews for our latest info. Your food matters. Keep it fresh. 5 ways to keep your food fresher longer. As the demand for quality and fresh food grows, so does the need for a reliable supply chain company. To keep food fresh across the supply chain, the integration of temperature-sensitive storage and complex time-based distribution must be transparent, comprehensive and precise. “Maintaining the freshness, quality and safety of food is shared by all, including the consumer,” says Moses Akingbade, Director, Cold Chain Assurance. “A key factor in maintaining food safety, quality and freshness, is ensuring that products are handled and stored at temperatures appropriate for the type of food. It’s what we all need to do in order to ensure we are nourishing ourselves in a safe manner.” With over 65 years of experience with temperature-sensitive food, VersaCold can guarantee freshness from supplier to warehouse to store. But once food is delivered, it’s out of our hands. Here are 5 tips for keeping your food fresher longer. Partnership with Purpose: What makes a good fit? B&G Foods + VersaCold. VersaCold is a food-first company. And the best way we ensure this is through dedicated partnerships. As Director of National Accounts, Ian Sinclair works with VersaCold’s key accounts to help them achieve their goals with custom solutions based on their corporate objectives and business requirements. His main goal is building a strong partnership with clients to better understand how to grow their business. When B&G Foods, a food company with 125+ years of experience and 50+ iconic brands, were looking for a strategic partner in Canada, Ian knew VersaCold would be a perfect fit. The relationship evolved over the course of a year as the companies continued to build their trust and understanding of one another. For B&G Foods, finding the right partner was a huge decision, and for Ian that meant showing B&G how their food matters. We sat down with Ian and Tom Heslin, Director of Distribution at B&G Foods, to discuss the consumer journey process and what makes a good supply chain partner. Why Your food matters to Vera Penney. “Anything to do with food, VersaCold knows how to handle all the goods.” Our people here at VersaCold are the backbone of all that we do. So we’d like to introduce our new interview series that will continue to roll out in the months to come. These stories will feature different VersaCold employees across the cold supply chain and explore how their specific roles and personal dedication demonstrate their commitment to safety, quality and the freshness of the food families eat. We recently sat down with Vera Penney to chat about her role at VersaCold and why it’s so important to her. Vera has been with VersaCold and Atlas Cold Storage (a company VersaCold acquired over 10 years ago) for a combined 13+ years. She’s taken on many roles at a number of Southern Ontario locations over the course of her cold chain career—from inventory control to customer service to workflow control and, most recently, as a shunter at our new Milton location. Leveraging technology to stay on top: Where we are and where we’re going. There’s no doubt about it. Technology and the pursuit of innovation are essential to VersaCold’s commitment to our customers and ensuring the safety, quality and freshness of the food families eat. We recently sat down with our Chief Information Officer and SVP, Bala Puvitharan, to discuss the importance of technological advancement throughout the cold supply chain and the efforts VersaCold is taking to lead the charge. Here are 5 ways we are utilizing technology to stay ahead of the curve, support our customers and better our processes. There’s a solution for that. 5 ways our Supply Chain Solutions team can enhance your supply chain. VersaCold is an expansive end-to-end supply chain company and one of North America’s largest cold chain networks. But did you know we have an entire Supply Chain Solutions team dedicated to our customers? Meet the answer to the problems you never even knew you had. This is our know-how. Our Supply Chain Solutions team works to assess our customers’ requirements, processes, and activities throughout the supply chain—including warehousing services, transportation, and network design. This unique team strives for continuous improvement with one end goal in mind: getting your food where it needs to be, efficiently, safely, and fresh. Here are 5 ways our Supply Chain Solutions Team can enhance your supply chain. The Power of Partnership. How We’re Working with Bullfrog Power to Aid Local Renewable Energy Initiatives. Bullfrog Power is Canada's leading green energy provider, providing renewable energy solutions for both homes and businesses. Started in 2005 in Toronto, they are a renewable energy-based company with the ultimate goal of transitioning Canada into a low-carbon economy. The way it works is that businesses and homes sign up with Bullfrog to initially assess the energy they consume and then match that consumption by purchasing an equal amount of green, clean, renewable energy. That green energy then gets put back into the national grid, pipeline or fuel pool, displacing energy from polluting sources. VersaCold is proud to say that we’ve been choosing renewable electricity and renewable natural gas with Bullfrog Power since 2015. Through our partnership, we are reducing our emissions footprint and helping to green our energy systems. Our initial commitment is based off of our monthly energy usage at our corporate office in Richmond, BC, where we displace approximately 12.4 megawatts of conventional electricity with renewable electricity per month and 88.4 gigajoules of conventional natural gas with renewable natural gas per month. Through this renewable energy purchase, VersaCold now displaces 54.83 tonnes of CO2 annually, or 4.56 tonnes of CO2 monthly. “VersaCold has made sustainability an essential part of our commitment to the environment,” says Doug Harrison, President and CEO. “That’s why we’re proud to partner with Bullfrog Power to support green electricity and green natural gas at our head office. Not to mention the green outreach that our contribution supports.” Beyond matching our conventional energy usage with green energy, our partnership and monthly contribution also impact diverse communities throughout Canada by helping to fund green energy projects. And one of those initiatives, we’re proud to report, is helping a local community not too far from Richmond—the Skidegate community in Haida Gwaii, British Columbia. Haida Gwaii is a remote group of beautiful islands located off the coast of BC. It is home to the Haida people, a First Nations community that settled in the area over 8,000 years ago. Through Bullfrog Power’s Community Renewable Projects program, VersaCold recently supported the solar installation at Kay Llnagaay, Haida Gwaii’s cultural heritage centre. Prior to the project, the centre used 10 million litres of diesel fuel and paid more than $100K per year for electricity. The 100 kW solar installation, the largest community-owned renewable project in BC, reduces the community’s reliance on fossil fuels as well as its electricity costs. Powering the centre with energy from the sun also helps the Haida people continue to thrive as stewards of the land and sustain the cultural site, which plays such an important role in protecting and promoting their history. “This new solar project will leave a cleaner footprint on Haida Gwaii for years to come and serve as a reminder that there are local solutions we can act on today to move toward a clean energy future,” says Billy Yovanovich, Chief Skidegate Band Councillor. The project on Haida Gwaii is just one of more than 130 community renewable energy projects across Canada currently being supported through Bullfrog Power. The projects are not only increasing the amount of renewable energy in Canada and cleaning our grid—they are also providing important social and cultural impacts. VersaCold is proud to be a part of this amazing program and to support 100% green energy.