Jan Lembregts:
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Because typically when you do these projects, it is over
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the timeline and it's over budget.
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And that was not our case.
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It's been fast from the
get go, which is fun.
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Michelle Samson: Welcome to the
Growing Strathroy-Caradoc podcast.
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I'm your host, Michelle Samson
and I'd like you to join me as
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we explore Strathroy-Caradoc and
what makes it a place where people
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and businesses grow deep roots.
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In this episode, we're pulling back the
curtain on Strathroy-Caradoc's newest
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manufacturer and getting the full
story of how they landed here, from
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building a list of a hundred possible
locations to their grand opening in
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Strathroy in September, 2024, and
how it all happened in record time.
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Norbec is a Quebec based
manufacturer of walk-in coolers and
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freezers for restaurants, grocery
stores, hospitals, and the like.
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They've cornered 90% of all grocery
stores in Canada, and if you've been
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to a Tim Horton's, it's guaranteed that
the cream in your double-double was
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chilled in a Norbec walk-in cooler.
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They also make prefabricated insulated
metal walls that are used in commercial
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and industrial buildings like warehouses,
data centers, even mining projects.
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It's these architectural panels that
will be made in their brand new 156,000
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square foot facility in Strathroy.
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Norbec President and CEO, and our guest
for this episode, is Jan Lembregts.
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He says the company started small
on the south shore of Montreal
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before growing their business
across Canada and into the U S.
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Today they have 35 plants around
the world and three in Canada.
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The Strathroy facility is their
first in Ontario and marks a
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major expansion for the company.
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Jan Lembregts: We made the decision
to expand cause we lacked capacity.
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We've been fortunate that the products
that we make have a good appeal.
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It's a growing product category,
so we needed more capacity,
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so the big question was where?
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We had decided to go outside
Quebec because of the proximity to
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our customers and transport cost
logistics was important consideration.
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So for this plant we looked at about
a hundred different sites, which
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was a quite elaborate process.
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We looked at several sites in
Ontario, but also in several
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Midwestern states in the U.S.
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We had a fairly rigorous selection
process that we were helped by
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consultants that do just that,
site selection, decision making.
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Obviously, it's a complicated,
multivariable decision because you
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have proximity to customers, you have
suppliers, you have availability of
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qualified labor to draw from, you
have taxation, you have energy costs.
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It's a long list of variables
that obviously you try to
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score each location on.
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It's a trade off between what scores
best and what is most important.
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So it's quite an elaborate process
we looked at because this was an
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important decision for us because if
you built a plant in the wrong place
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you're stuck with it for a long time.
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Michelle Samson: Yeah!
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Jan Lembregts: It's hard to undo
once you're, once you build it.
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So Strathroy scored very
good our decision making model.
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Like any decision, you try to
rationalize it with facts and data.
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But in the end, it's also
an emotional decision.
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You get a feeling pretty
quickly, do I want to be here
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or do I not want to be here?
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It's like buying a house . Typically,
it doesn't take very long
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before you make up your mind.
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When we looked at Strathroy, actually,
it did score good on the criteria that
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we have given ourselves, and we liked
the site, it was good looking site.
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And then when we met the
people in Strathroy, the town
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was very welcoming, really.
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The town itself as
well, instantly liked it.
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And I like farming, and for
our operation, we need space.
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We need proximity to the U.S.
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We need obviously, first and foremost,
to develop the market in Ontario.
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So really it felt, it all felt good.
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The town people were efficient.
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It's rural but it's not that rural either.
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It's a nice town and then the
proximity to London, which is fairly
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straightforward and an easy to draw for
more technical people that we need.
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It all made sense quickly and we actually
decided this very quickly after we saw it.
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Michelle Samson: After this extensive
search, Norbec ultimately purchased a
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20 acre property in Strathroy's Molnar
Industrial Park right next to highway 402.
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As Jan said, the decision to
buy that property was quick.
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So was the construction of the
plant, which they got done in 14
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months, if you can believe it.
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I asked Jan how they were able to
achieve such a remarkable feat.
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Jan Lembregts: From the start
we really wanted to do this fast
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because we needed this plant to
continue to grow our business.
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The recipe for success to do something
fast is obviously, it's multiple things.
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But, from our side, first
we created a very small,
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dedicated, highly qualified team.
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Really, I'm talking two or three people.
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Stéphane, our project leader,
relocated from Quebec to
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Strathroy to start the project.
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He had operated a similar plant for
15 years, and he had built already
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a plant in Quebec for us, so he was
a unique experience to do this well,
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to design the right plant . And very
much empowered to make decisions as
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well from the company's perspective.
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So a small, dedicated, competent
team that can make decisions.
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That's always, to avoid red tape and to
avoid wasting time, that is valuable.
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The other major component was we
decided on a really good general
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contractor, Vicano Construction, that
we knew before as well because we
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sell to general contractors or they're
sub trade, so it was a customer.
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So we chose a general contractor
that we, that we had confidence in,
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that we thought could move quickly.
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And then we also built the
plant with their own products.
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We manufactured them, so that
was easy to control that, to do
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that fast and to do that well.
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And then, last but not least,
the town was really good, because
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the whole permitting is huge.
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You can get into such unbelievable
delays if, if the town, or the whatever
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regulatory instance you have to deal
with doesn't cooperate and for sure
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if you're, if you'd be building in the
GTA, you're one of 300 projects then
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you're probably falling somewhere
in the inbox on a low priority.
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But for Strathroy this was a significant
project, so they were very motivated
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to go as fast as regulation permits.
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It was very collaborative.
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So these different elements
combined, and it went fast.
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I was impressed myself, to be
honest, because typically when
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you do these projects, it is over
the timeline and it's over budget.
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And that was not our case.
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Okay, it was a little bit more expensive,
but we met our timelines and it's been
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fast from the get go, which is fun.
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Michelle Samson: That's fantastic.
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It's one thing for a municipality to say
they're open for business but it's another
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thing for you to actually experience
it and for someone like you to say it.
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Jan Lembregts: It's not all the town
either, because there's jurisdiction
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over part of it, but then obviously
you have environment, you have
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other things, but they but can
assist and they have assisted.
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It makes all the difference if
there's a can do attitude and that if
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there's an issue that people answer
the phone and if there's issues
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that they're solution based approach
versus a problem based approach.
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Michelle Samson: So true.
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Jan Lembregts: That was a really good
experience and the town was wonderful.
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Michelle Samson: And were there any
particular hiccups along the way?
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Jan Lembregts: Nothing out of the
ordinary that you would say that,
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hey, this where it gets complicated
if environmental assessments and rare
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species potentially . We scratched
our head a few times, but nothing that
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stopped us in our tracks or that went
beyond a few scares here and there.
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It was all good.
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Michelle Samson: No hiccups is very
good when you're spending $45 million
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to build a plant from the ground up.
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And not just any old plant, but one
that has been described as ultra modern.
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I asked Jan what kinds of cutting-edge
features they invested in.
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Jan Lembregts: Yeah, for what we
do, insulated metal panels, we think
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this is best plant North America.
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Occasionally I say in the world,
but maybe that's a bit of a stretch.
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But in North America, I think this is
a really state of the art facility.
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For one, it's a thousand feet
long machine, which is a long
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machine with multiple steps and
processes and it's fully automated.
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The automation sets us apart the
size, the capacity, it's really the
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best equipment that we could buy.
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Our philosophy is to give
ourselves the best tools.
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It's more expensive when you build it,
but then, over a lifetime of a project,
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it becomes, it's like building a road,
you can build it cheaper, but then you
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have to redo it three months later, or
three years later, so we rather look at
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what we think the lifetime performance
will be of a, of an investment like that.
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There's Artificial Intelligence
in the plant, for example, which
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is really new for quality control.
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We also, we spent a lot of time making
it an employee friendly environment
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as well, because for this process
to run well, our employees have to
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be in a good spot because it all
goes fast and it's automated, so we
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create an environment where we think
it's very employee friendly, very
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safe as well, and very automated.
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Michelle Samson: There's been
a lot of talk in manufacturing
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lately about productivity.
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So this must be fantastic
for your productivity.
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Jan Lembregts: Yes.
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And the reason for the success of this
project as well is that in construction
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there's a shortage of construction labor.
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And the, since our insulated
metal panels are prefabricated,
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they install very quickly.
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So it's really a double saving
of productivity success, both
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automated on our side, but then it's
very efficient and very low labor
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to install it on a construction
site because it's prefabricated.
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It's a prefabricated wall
assembly or roof assembly.
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It installs extremely quickly, and with
the shortage of construction labor and
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the amount of construction that has to
happen in to keep up with housing, that's
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a real positive not just for us, but also
for the construction industry itself.
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Michelle Samson: So in Strathroy,
Norbec will be producing these
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insulated metal panels with a
workforce of 70 people who are a mix
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of engineers and production operators.
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While the workforce is 70 people
now, it's possible that there
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could be a lot more in the future.
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Jan Lembregts: There's a possibility
later on to do other phases.
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It will take some time to fill this
facility because we can make more panels
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in that plant than Ontario consumes, so
it's going to take a while to fill it up
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and we have to also develop the Midwest.
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Then there may be subsequent
phases in that we obviously would
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have more employees from there.
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That's not scoped yet, but there's
definitely growth possible on that site.
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It's a fairly large site.
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So we hope to make it one of
our prime locations really.
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Michelle Samson: So for those
initial 70, how has the
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recruitment process been so far?
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Jan Lembregts: It has been wonderful.
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Honestly it has totally surpassed our
expectation because we, while we were
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building things have loosened up now
a little bit, especially in Quebec.
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And also in Ontario, but since we didn't
have plants, we didn't live with that
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much, but the labor shortage was an
acute problem, like really a bad problem.
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So we were very scared of not
being able to find the people
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we need to run the plant.
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And especially in our case, because
we, it's just a mid sized business
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that has been growing relatively fast.
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We can't just send the
whole team out there.
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We don't have these people.
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So have to start and build
this plant mainly with all new
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employees, which we have done.
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And if there's one thing that I'm
extremely happy about is the people that
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we have been able to hire in Strathroy.
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We hired a wonderful team.
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Nothing but good experience.
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First a lot of applicants, which we
were very surprised about, because
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I don't know, it is something that
we hadn't seen for a long time.
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We have had the luxury of many
people interested in what we
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offered there, that was great.
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And then, also the quality of the people
like really, qualified technicians and our
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plant manager Simon has been wonderful.
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We obviously, we trained them here
in Quebec in our facilities here.
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So we spent time with our new
employees and our company culture,
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which we take very serious.
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We wanted to start and export what we
think is a winning corporate culture to
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our new facility in Strathroy and, despite
the language barrier, French and English
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and some of the funny issues around that,
I think we started with the right foot
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forward setting the base for consistent
corporate culture and been very happy how
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our new employees have signed up for that.
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And it has been a very good experience.
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Probably the best cause everyone
can buy equipment, money is a
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commodity, but having the right
people, that's not a commodity.
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That's, that is what makes the difference,
if you can build the right team.
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So it's really the, team that we
built that is going to make it happen.
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Very pleased, extremely pleased.
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Michelle Samson: I asked Jan if his
experience getting lots of high quality
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applicants has raised his confidence
that he'll have a similar experience if
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or when Norbec expands in the future.
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He said that he is, pointing to
Ontario's long legacy of having
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a strong manufacturing base.
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So he's as reasonably confident as
he can be that they'll find the team
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they need today and in the future.
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Which was in fact, a perfect segue.
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For my last question, I asked him about
his vision for the Strathroy plant.
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Of course, the plant is still brand
new so for the moment, Jan is primarily
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focused on getting it started up,
which is on track and going well
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so far, but he emphasized that it's
really important to get this right.
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Jan Lembregts: It's our third factory,
but by far our most sophisticated factory.
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So this has to, it's really the
backbone of our next three to
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five year growth for our company.
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Beyond that there's quite a bit of
growth potential on the actual site.
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We could build a second plant here.
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We could do some other part of
our business potentially as well.
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So it's it's key site And this
has been one of these projects for
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us that, it's an all-in project.
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We, it's something we have to make work.
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So we're very motivated to
make that a real success.
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I think it's also, for Strathroy,
it's a nice industry as well to
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bring to Strathroy because there's
possible offsprings that are
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related that could help the town.
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And so I think it's really
positive for us and for the town.
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I'm excited about it, excited to bring
to Ontario as well our expertise because
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what we do is very few players that
do this, so it's fairly specialized,
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it's a long learning process to
do this well, which we have done,
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we've been doing it for 40 years.
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The plant that we built in Strathroy,
we've done that for close to 20 years
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now, so we have an expertise in that, I
think, that is exciting for us, obviously.
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We're motivated by that for sure, but
I think also for the construction in
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Ontario, because it's a, it's really a
product that solves issues in terms of
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installation labor, in terms of energy
efficiency and energy consumption.
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So it's, I think, it's just a
positive, exciting development.
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Michelle Samson: Many thanks to Jan
Lembregts, the President and CEO
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of Norbec, for coming on the show.
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You can learn more about Norbec
via the links in the show notes.
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If Strathroy-Caradoc sounds like
a community you'd like to move to,
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learn more at strathroy-caradoc.ca.
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If this episode has encouraged
you to invest here, you should
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connect with Heather Lalonde,
our Development Commissioner.
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Her contact coordinates and more
information about the community can be
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found at investstrathroy-caradoc.ca.
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More episodes of Growing Strathroy-Caradoc
are coming in the new year.
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Follow us on Apple, Spotify, or
your favorite podcast platform
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to be notified when it drops
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Michelle: This podcast was
produced by Storied Places Media.
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Thanks for listening.
