Canada's Greenest Employers (2025) - Flipbook - Page 44
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CANADA'S GREENEST EMPLOYERS (2025)
Ice River innovations have led the green sector
F
ounded in 1995 as a
family-run company
focused on producing
high-quality,
environmentally
responsible spring water, Ice River
Sustainable Solutions
subsequently turned its attention
to the plastic footprint of the
bottles used to market its product.
Starting in 2010, the company,
headquartered in Shelburne, Ont.,
investigated ways to take
polyethylene terephthalate (PET)
purchased from the Ontario Blue
Box program and transform it into
new, fully recyclable bottles.
take no for an answer’”.
In addition to packaging and
delivering its own green-bottled
brand, Ice River today partners
with nearly every other privatelabel bottled water producer. “A
lot of the bottled water sold in
Canada now is contained in a
100-per-cent recycled bottle,” says
Howe. “I like to think we were at
the forefront of showing what is
possible.”
The innovation continues.
Recycling plastic bottle caps was a
whole separate challenge, one Ice
River ultimately solved by
acquiring C.R. Plastic Products, a
company based in Stratford, Ont.,
which is now using bottle caps
recycled by Ice River to produce
premium outdoor furniture.
In fact, Ice River is today a
collection of eight companies that
includes package manufacturing,
transportation and even an
organic farm (the original source
of the spring water). It’s all part of
an effort to create a circular
economy that is entirely Canadian
and keeps things local.
“We sell to Canadians, using raw
materials collected from
Canadians,” says Howe. “That’s a
business benefit, as our supply
chain is somewhat protected from
variables such as the threat of
tariffs.”
Internally, the company further
promotes sustainability through
initiatives like Operation Clean
Sweep, which addresses potential
on-site spills and plastic leakage,
as well as efforts to avoid diverting
any waste to landfill.
The company is also working
aggressively to reduce its carbon
footprint, something that
sustainability program manager
Marram Mohammad is helping to
spearhead.
“I conducted a carbon analysis
of our operations and came up
with energy-efficiency projects to
reduce our carbon footprint,” says
Mohammad. “Our ownership and
executive team took my recommendations and put real money
They are demonstrating
you can be a successful
business while prioritizing
the environment. You don’t
have to sacrifice one for the
other.
— Marram Mohammad
Sustainability Manager
Ice River became the first
beverage company in North
America to build and operate its
own recycling facility, producing
bottles made from 100-per-cent
recycled plastic. Over the past 15
years, this advancement has kept
more than 700 million pounds of
plastic out of the landfill.
“No one was doing this, and we
were told it was impossible,” says
Crystal Howe, director of
sustainability, who is also the
daughter of company co-founders
Jamie and Sandy Gott. “But when
you tell my dad something like
that, he just says, ‘we will never
The Gott Family, founders of Ice River Sustainable Solutions, at the organization’s head office.
