Intercity Packers Meat and Seafood

Richmond, BC.

About Us

Intercity Packers (ICP) had humble beginnings and was founded in what is now known as the Olympic Village in Vancouver, BC by Gary Mathies and Jim Sarangi. Their meat product offerings began with beef, pork, lamb, chicken and game products and were sold to local restaurants.

Over the course of 5 decades, Intercity Packers has cultivated a rich history of bringing customers high quality and carefully sourced products accompanied by the best customer service. We recognize our role in ensuring an eco-friendly, sustainable future for the meat and seafood we buy and sell, as well as for the health of the land and oceans. We are dedicated to being a proactive leader that is well positioned to supply the most sustainable meat and seafood products available on the market.

On Defining Sustainability

We believe Sustainability consists of three distinct pillars – Environmental, Financial and Social and that all three are essential for proteins to be deemed sustainable. Too often the industry and general public measure sustainability based on only the environmental pillar and while that’s certainly important, without the other two pillars our commitment to sustainability would tumble.

Sustainable food is wild-caught or farmed in ways that consider the long-term viability of the resource and the communities they support. Choosing sustainable meat and seafood that is on the way towards sustainability is an effective way to support best practices to ensure the resource lasts long into the future.

Why we are part of a sustainable supply chain

We recognize our role in ensuring an eco-friendly, sustainable future for the meat and seafood we buy and sell, as well as for the health of the land and oceans. By having our systems audited for tracking beef from Canadian farms and ranches certified to the Canadian Roundtable of Sustainable Beef's sustainability standards, we are contributing to bringing beef sustainability to our customers. This is another great example of a program to add to our offerings that made sense for our company to join to bring value to our customers.

In March 2021, we further demonstrated our commitment by adding sustainable sourcing in our Intercity Custom Meats brand from CRSB Certified farms and ranches. We are now actively contributing to beef sustainability in Canada and supporting the sustainable practices on Canadian farms and ranches by sourcing a minimum of 30% of our beef from CRSB Certified sources.

Our dedicated team is proud to hold the sustainability Chain of Custody certification from Canadian Roundtable for Sustainable Beef as we continue to aim to be a model of sustainability in the Canadian marketplace. - Brock Farrall, Director of Marketing & Procurement of Intercity Packers Ltd.

Learn more about our commitment to our customers

Our Sustainable Practices

Our sustainability mission statement incorporates sustainability on many levels...

• We will profitably source and distribute the highest quality products for our customers while continually expanding our offerings of sustainable products.
• We are fully committed to engaging our supplier partners, employees, customers and members of the conservation community to ensure a productive, sustainable future for both wild and farmed products
• We will source, purchase and promote products that offer our customers alternatives for items that do not meet current sustainability criteria. Additionally we will selectively work with those farms, fisheries and aquaculture projects that do not meet current sustainability criteria to help assist these groups to improve their sustainability ranking.
• We will work with our supplier partners to improve and provide complete, detailed and transparent product traceability information for our customers.
• We will openly collect and share current and relevant information regarding our sustainability practices with our customers, employees, supplier partners, and the public
• We will educate our employees, supplier partners and customers on our guiding principles associated with sustainably sourced products.
• We will encourage policymakers to improve and develop laws and regulations that support the improvement of farms, fisheries and aquaculture management and enforcement.
• We will work towards implementing and maintaining innovative business and operational practices that will minimize our overall impact on the environment.

We have been audited and meet the Canadian Roundtable for Sustainable Beef (CRSB)’s Chain of Custody Requirements.

This means that our systems have undergone a 3rd party verification to ensure that we are working with our industry supply chain partners to source beef from CRSB Certified farms and ranches, and are able to back up the claims in our own steak programs, as well as for our customers.

What we want you to know...

We believe in the continuous improvement process and take an active role in promoting and assisting sustainable beef farmers and ranchers. We encourage our valuable customers to utilize the sustainable beef options on the market. There is endless value in making sustainable choices on menu offerings, and demonstrates the leadership of Canadian beef production to consumers across Canada.