Northmar Distributors announced recently it is closing its Oak Street West operation in North Bay. More than 50 employees are expected to be out of work by Aug. 10.
The North Bay Northmar distributed everything from cigarettes and candy to grocery items and juices to convenience stores throughout Northern Ontario. The plant has been in North Bay since the late 1920s or early '30s.
The plant at 495 Oak St. W. abuts Memorial Drive and has a number of doors where transports sit while being loaded.
The shutdown affected about the same number of employees at the Peterborough plant.
Senior officials of the company, a division of Mac's Convenience Stores Inc., sat down with the parent company, Alimentation Couche-Tard Inc., of Laval, Que., and studied a number of alternatives. In the end, a third party, Karrys Bros. Ltd., of Mississauga, won out. It specializes in convenience store distribution and is located within the larger market of the Greater Toronto Area. Karrys will now distribute throughout the province.
There have been consolidations in the food distribution industry and Northmar was hampered by two antiquated district facilities.
