Updated Comparison of Grocery Store House Brands, surprising shifts in Sobey’s Compliments and Walmart’s Great Value

We originally compared Canadian content claims of the major grocery store house brands in a March 25, 2025 blog post, as six months have passed it seemed like it would be worth revisiting to see if anything had changed.

There were significant changes in both Compliments (Sobey’s, Safeway, Farm Boy, Longo’s and IGA) and Great Value (Walmart). While Compliments is a Canadian owned brand it performed much worse in this analysis than the Great Value brand which is American owned.

It is possible the changes are mainly a result of updating information, but it could also be that Great Value responded to the Buy Canadian movement by trying to find more Canadian suppliers. In the case of Compliments, it is hard to understand why they would have less Canadian content but in their case the change may reflect adding new products from more diverse international suppliers rather than deliberately trying to reduce the number of Canadian suppliers.

Note that the links in the paragraphs below each go to a full list of the Canadian items from each of the house brands.

Canadian content of President’s Choice products has changed only slightly

President’s Choice, commonly known as PC is one of the house brands of the Canadian owned grocery network of Loblaws, Maxi, Real Atlantic Superstore, Real Canadian Superstore, Loblaws, Dominion, T&T Supermarket, Zehrs, Fortinos, SuperValu, Valu-mart, Freshmart, Your Independent Grocer, No Frills, and Wholesale Club.

President’s Choice combined with other PC brands such as PC Blue Menu have a total of 3,778 (previously) 3,845 items showing on the Real Canadian Superstore website, 1,411 (previously 1,395) of which are identified as Prepared in Canada. That means 37% (previously 36%) of President’s Choice items are identified as prepared in Canada or better.

Unfortunately, the vague term prepared in Canada is being used to capture the full range of Canadian food preparation and likely includes many items that could be marked as made in Canada (minimum of 51% Canadian production value) and potentially product of Canada (minimum of 98% Canadian production value).

Canadian content of No Name products has changed only slightly

No Name is also a house brand of the Loblaws group and is sold at the same stores as President’s Choice. A total of 1,239 (previously 1,131) items are listed on the Real Canadian Superstore website with 532 (previously 480) identified as Prepared in Canada. This gives a total of 43% (previously 42%) of No Name items that are identified as prepared in Canada or better.

The number of Compliements products identified as Canadian decreases while the total number of Compliments branded products increases leading to a big percentage decrease

The Canadian owned grocery chain of Safeway, Sobey’s, Farm Boy, Longo’s, and IGA, uses the Voilà delivery service, who’s mobile app lists 4,044 (previously 3,088) items of compliments products, of which 1,490 (previously 1,641) are marked as “Shop Canadian”, giving a total of 37% (previously 53%) of Compliments items identified as Canadian. The Voilà website says items in this category are made in Canada from domestic and imported ingredients.

This change could be a result of increasing the accuracy of their Canadian content claims or an actual shift away from Canadian suppliers which would be very concerning.

Are Western Family products made in Canada?

Western Family is the house brand of the Canadian owned grocery network of Save on Foods, PriceSmart, Nesters Market and Urban Fare, located in BC, Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba and Yukon.

Western family has a total of 1,729 (previously 1,835) items showing on the Save on Foods website, 671 (previously 704) of which are identified as Made in Canada and a further 149 (previously 158) are identified as Product of Canada. Another 3 items are labelled as Shop Canadian. That means 48% (previously 47%) of Western Family items are identified as made in Canada or better.

Save-On-Foods stands out from other grocery retailers because it is listing products as either made in Canada or as Product of Canada. This is a significant improvement compared to the competition discussed above.

Almost no change with Irresisitibles, Selection and Life Smart products which remain the most Canadian by percentage

Irresistibles, Selection and Life Smart are the house brands of Metro grocery store brand which includes Metro, Metro Plus, Super C, Food Basics, Adonis, Première Moisson, Jean Coutu and Brunet, located in Québec and Ontario. A total of 1,619 (previously 1,601) items are listed on the metro website with 979 (unchanged) identified as Canadian products. This gives a total of 60% (previously 61%) of Irresistibles, Selection and Life Smart items that are identified as Canadian products.

Metro does not provide a definition of Canadian products, accordingly it should be assumed to include all types of Canadian content including prepared in Canada, made in Canada and product of Canada.

Still no data from Costco on which Kirkland products are made in Canada

Kirkland Signature is the house brand of the American owned retail membership club Costco. Costco is not currently providing much information on the country of origin of Kirkland products through their website. We have a few made in Canada Kirkland products listed on ShopCanadianStuff.ca, if you know of others, please hit the add listing button in the top right corner of the home page or add a comment to this blog. We don’t have enough information to calculate a percentage but it does seem to be low. ShopCanadianStuff.ca has reached out to Costco Canada to request information but have not been provided any.

Walmart’s Great Value brand products have greatly increased their reported Canadian content

Great Value is the house brand of the American owned variety store of Walmart.

Great Value now has a total of 1,450 items (previously 1,486) showing on the Walmart.ca website, 661 (previously 437) of which are identified as Made in Canada. That means 46% (previously 28%) of Great Value items are identified as made in Canada or better.

The Best Made in Canada House brand?

Metro retains the highest percentage of identified Canadian content at 60% (down from 61%) for the Irresistibles, Selection and Life Smart brands, unfortunately Metro hasn’t provided a clear definition of the Canadian content criteria they are using.

Save-On-Foods’ Western family, along with Loblaws’ Presidents Choice and No Name each increased their Canadian content by 1%, moving to 48% for Western Family, 37% for Presidents Choice and 43% for No Name.

Walmart’s Great Value brand made major changes moving from 28% to 46% Canadian content, the third highest behind Metro and Save-On-Foods.

Compliments had a significant decrease in reported Canadian content dropping from 53% to 37%, in part due to listing less Canadian items but mostly due to a large increase in the total number or items, leaving Compliments tied for last with Presidents Choice.