Canadian Startup Success Stories: 4 Inspiring Canadian Companies

Amid sweeping tariffs from the US, supporting Canadian businesses is more important than ever. But regardless of what has happened or will happen between Canada and the US, doing so is and always will be important. Buying Canadian and supporting the local economy not only makes an impact with your dollar, but also strengthens the potential for today’s Canadian businesses to continue growing and evolving into tomorrow’s industry leaders and job creators.

Today we are sharing the stories of four Canadian startups who not only provide exceptional Canadian products and services, but also tell inspiring tales of triumph while navigating the challenges of entrepreneurship. Their stories cement the importance of supporting Canadian startups today on their journey to becoming the drivers of tomorrow’s economy.

Goodfood

Workhaus community members Goodfood are a Canadian owned business offering meal-kit delivery services. The company was founded in Montreal in 2014 by CEO Jonathan Ferrari & President-COO Neil Cuggy. Long before talk of US tariffs, they have been supporting Canadian farmers, suppliers and startups. Although seasonal availability can sometimes present a challenge, the company is committed to ensuring that 85% of the contents of each box are either sourced from or packaged in Canada.

“When people really care about where their food comes from and how it’s grown, it creates better food. It’s so much more flavourful. It has a better impact on the environment because it’s coming from somewhere that’s closer to home. We’re also nurturing partnerships with farmers who are using the latest Earth-friendly technologies to do things like reduce water use and transportation times, and eliminate pesticides,” Jonathan shares in their origin story.

Neil adds: “By focusing on local partnerships, we’re enabling nearby economies, which will benefit both our customers and employees.”

Goodfood started small. The first Goodfood kits were made by two people in a small Montreal apartment, but within just four years their team grew to include over 800 employees. In 2017 they went public and now have over 1500 employees, serving over 300,000 households in Canada. They also closed 2024 with a record gross annual margin of 41.2% and adjusted free cash flow of $8 million.

Outside of Goodfood, Neil Cuggy is an investor and CEO Advisor at ROU Partners, Uruguay’s first search fund. Ferrari is a McGill grad Canada’s Top 40 Under 40 honouree. He’s also a Co-founder of the entrepreneurial investment firm MTL Capital LLC. Entrepreneurship is something that’s clearly important to Ferrari. In 2018, he told Devenir Entrepreneur:

“It’s important to create a community around entrepreneurship, because sometimes it gets hard. This career has a lot of high and low points, so it’s important to have partners or a community that can support you.”

Jonathan Ferrari

We couldn’t agree more!

Genuine Tea

Toronto-based Genuine Tea is an award winning third-wave craft tea company. All their teas are proudly blended and packed in Canada. Co-founders David O’Connor (President) and Sarah Wilcox (CEO) lived together in Taiwan for five years. During that time, they visited plantations across Asia and learned about the world of hand-crafted teas. They brought that knowledge and inspiration back to Canada and channeled it into what would become Genuine Tea.

“We moved back to Toronto without a penny and started selling tea at local farmer’s markets and, in 2015, Genuine Tea went from a seed, to a tiny little sprout. We made $80 in revenue. After costs, we probably didn’t make a penny. But it didn’t matter, with time, dedication, hard work and each other Sarah Wilcox and I knew we had started a new adventure – one very few of us ever take – as Entrepreneurs.”

David O’Connor, via LinkedIn

Their big break came after three years of hard work and dedication, when they auditioned for Dragon’s Den Canada in 2018. They received four offers from the Dragons and ultimately partnered with Arlene Dickinson and District Ventures Capital.

They’ve come a long way since then. Genuine Tea has received ample praise, support, and awards from Canadian consumers and press. In their most recent fiscal year, they saw over $3.5 million dollars of net sales. In other big news, Goodfood recently acquired an 81% interest in the company, along with the rights to acquire the remaining shares in the future. O’Connor and Wilcox continue to lead the business.

Ritual

Workhaus alumni Ritual offers a food ordering app that allows users to place orders for pick-up. With Ritual, users can skip the line up at their favourite restaurants and find new favourites. Their offerings include company programs that allow employers to set up meal credits for their teams as a perk. Their piggyback feature even lets teams order together for a single pickup. On the restaurant side, Ritual offers exposure and a streamlined way to build customer loyalty programs. Meanwhile, they charge the restaurant only 10–13% of the sale total — much less than the typical 25–30% charged by major food delivery apps like Uber. Needless to say, this app is a great way to support Canadian businesses by ordering from local restaurants.

Ritual was co-founded by Robert Kim (now CEO of Karrot North America), Ray Reddy and Larry Stinson. Reddy recently left to take on the role of VP at Canadian multinational e-commerce company Shopify. They began work on the app after Reddy’s first startup, PushLife, was acquired by Google. 

The Founders’ Vision

The founders took inspiration from their experience receiving personalized treatment as regular patrons in a London pub, where they were greeted by name. In the midst of the pivot from analog to digital taking place in nearly every industry, Reddy saw an opportunity. “We’re going to move away from paper receipts and anonymous customers to a digital experience,” he told Product Hunt Toronto. “So what does that mean? It means a store can know exactly who you are when you walk in. You’re not an anonymous customer. It changes the way you discover products. It’s the sort of experience that Amazon has enabled.” And so Ritual was born.

In conversation with Toronto Life, Reddy recounted the early success of the app. “We asked some companies in King West if they’d consider replacing catered office lunches with Ritual—they’d just deposit a credit on employees’ accounts, and they’d choose what they wanted to eat. It caught fire instantly. Before the app even had a name, 1,000 people had signed up.”

The app currently features thousands of restaurants and has well over one hundred employees.

Float 

Kitchener-Waterloo based financial services company Float offers corporate credit cards and expense management solutions. The company was co-founded by software developer Griffin Keglevich and perception engineer Ruslan Nikolaev. Their mission is to simplify spending for companies and teams. The two met at the University of Waterloo and coined the idea for Float in 2019 while working on a different project at the Velocity Incubator in Kitchener.

“Keglevich’s and Nikolaev’s first months at Velocity was solely spent on customer discovery. Float incorporated in 2020 and after raising a pre-seed round and building the first version of their corporate expense card for small businesses, they recruited Rob Khazzam, the former general manager at Uber Canada, as the third co-founder and CEO of Float,” reads a UWaterloo news piece from last year.

Since then, Float has established itself as a valuable solution for growing Canadian businesses, supporting and empowering teams. In a recent blog post their CEO reflected on the company’s impact: “Over the past four years, our customers have told us that Float has revolutionized the way they do finance. Made their team’s work smoother and more efficient. Empowered employees and removed roadblocks. Matched their speed and sense of purpose. How they will be loyal to Float forever because it’s given them back hours they used to spend on tedious manual processes, time they can now put back into their business.” He continued:

As the son of a small business owner myself, I couldn’t be prouder and more grateful to be working alongside these owners, operators and finance leaders—the true backbone of our country.”

Rob Khazzam

They also recently secured $70M CAD in series B funding. In a statement, they shared plans to use that money to accelerate product expansion, hire top talent and expand their leadership in the Canadian market coast-to-coast.

Are You a Canadian Business? Share Your Story with Workhaus

Canada’s business landscape is rich with innovation and potential, and at Workhaus, we’re proud to be part of that story. From our own journey as a Canadian startup to building a thriving community of business owners, founders, and entrepreneurs, we’ve seen firsthand the power of homegrown ideas. That’s why we’re so passionate about uplifting small businesses and sharing their stories.

Across the Canadian business ecosystem, countless companies are championing bold ideas and pushing the boundaries of what’s possible. While trade relationships may ebb and flow, the importance of supporting Canadian businesses is unwavering. Their stories highlight the resilience and ambition that define Canada’s entrepreneurial spirit—proving that investing in local innovation not only drives our economy forward but also unlocks new opportunities for emerging startups to flourish.

Are you a Canadian business impacted by the ongoing trade conflict with the US? Let us know @workhauslife.