I'm going to be speaking first. I'll do my comments in French. Peter will complete his comments in English.
Good afternoon, everyone. My name is James Laws and I am the Executive Director of the Canadian Meat Council in Ottawa. With me today is Peter Stein, Director, Quality Assurance and Food Safety, Piller Sausages and Delicatessens Ltd.
Piller's is one of North America's largest producers of European sausages and delicatessen-style meats, famous for award-winning products, such as Black Forest ham and European- style dry cured salamis. They also make the number-one selling dry- cured pepperoni in Canada according to ACNielsen data. They are headquartered in Waterloo, Ontario.
Their customers are nation-wide and they also export to the United States. And some of their customers are considered high-risk customers like hospitals, retirement homes etc. They recognize, as do others, the responsibility of supplying these types of customers from the top down.
Piller Sausages and Delicatessens Ltd. has been a member of the Canadian Meat Council for 35 years. Just last month in Montreal at our 89th annual conference Wilhelm Huber Senior, the founder of Piller's, was presented with our President's award for outstanding service and support to the Canadian Meat Council. He served on our board for many years as does his son Conrad Huber, now a past president and a member of our executive committee.
Wilhelm Huber Senior is the founder and chairman of the board of the Piller's group of companies and he has been a fourth generation master butcher and sausage-maker since 1949—that's 60 years. He immigrated to Canada in 1954 from Austria with only two suitcases and got his first job in Montreal with Sepp's Sausages as master sausage-maker. In 1957, he moved his family to Waterloo, Ontario with $500 and started a company called Piller Sausages and Delicatessens Ltd.
Today, the Piller's group of five federally registered companies consists of Piller's Sausages, Kretschmar, Golden Valley Farms, Piller’s Fine Foods and Piller's Distribution Centre and employs over 700 people. And Piller's is still a Canadian family-owned and run business with Wilhelm's two nephews and three sons on the senior management team. In fact I believe there is a history book on the family that is currently being passed around the table.
As meat processors we are one link in the food safety chain in Canada. From the farmer to the slaughter and cut plants to the processors like Piller's to the retailers and finally the end user we all need to have food safety up front and centre so that we pass on a safe product to the next link in the chain. This chain is the same and carries the same responsibility no matter if you're a local, provincial or federally registered establishment. It's a matter of principle, attitude and accountability.
Piller's was a provincial plant 41 years ago. And then they made the change to become federal in 1968. They have been very successful since then proving that the successful transition from provincial to federal is very possible.
Peter Stein was hired by Piller's in February of this year to be their new Director, Quality Assurance and Food Safety. Peter has been active on our technical committee for 12 years and has been a member of our Listeria working group since last summer. He is also on the industry best practice committee specifically contributing to the sanitization component. Peter worked for over 20 years for JohnsonDiversey—a leading global provider of commercial cleaning and hygiene products and technical support for food safety. Peter specifically provided the technical support to the meat and poultry sectors in plant hygiene and sanitation programs. Peter has been through most federal meat processing plants across Canada and many in the United States, and he likely knows more about in-plant Listeria control than anyone I know.
Listeria control is about good plant hygiene—good manufacturing practices, and cleaning the plant and equipment. But, it's also about equipment and building design; it's about proper maintenance and cross-contamination control; it's about control of the flow of people and products in the work environment and it's about environmental sampling of the packaging room and slicers and beyond.
I'll pass it over to Peter to explain what's been happening at Piller's.