Superior Propane Impressed With Thunder Bay
By Scott A. Sumner
Thunder Bay Business
The 6th Floor of West Arthur Place was an empty shell 3 months ago when John Gleason, President of Superior Propane was here last. Now it is a fully functional office operating with 30 trained staff almost all of whom are from Thunder Bay. “ We looked across the country and
wanted a good, well educated base of employees that had a broad base of experience to bring into our new structure which is very focussed on customer service, customer call resolution, accounting, account receivable and other office administrative work. We were looking for
a well skilled work force and Thunder Bay was hands down the place to be,” smiled John Gleason, President of Superior Propane. “ The city was very open and friendly from the economic development group to training provided by Confederation College. In fact Confederation College actually ended up training across the country for us, so we were
totally impressed with what we saw. To think that we went from nothing to 30 trained people in 90 days is amazing. Phenomenal! I still can’t believe what I saw this morning.”
“ We had over 400 applicants for the openings that we had. To be able to do this in Calgary would be almost impossible. We would be doing this a year later and probably suffering in excess of 20 % turnover of staff. A stable workplace will provide better service to
our customers of our product offerings. We think we will grow the business this way.” noted Gleason. Superior Propane has expansion potential on their existing floor space and has an option on some additional space. They can hold up to 100 staff in the office and in the next 2 to 3 years hope to grow to that level, according to Gleason.
“ The economic development group here has to sell Thunder Bay and we would be more than happy to answer any queries from other companies like us across the country. Thunder Bay is a city that hasn’t got as much press as it should have. It does have a great university and college, great health care and is a beautiful city with a population that is looking for emoyment,” stated Gleason. “ There is a long term option in this city. Superior Propane is growing and we are having a great quarter.”
“ Superior Propane moving here tells us an awful lot about the community and it’s willingness to welcome new businesses to Thunder Bay and our future potential to go after more business particularly in Western Canada. Here we are talking about a national company
headquartered in Calgary picking Thunder Bay,” notes Steve Demming CEO of the Thunder Bay Economic Development Commission. “ All of Western Canada is on fire in terms of their economy. This means there is enormous opportunity for us in Thunder Bay. In Alberta there are more labour interruptions and costs are up over 40% from 2 years ago.
Thunder Bay has a opportunity to service the west.”
The Thunder Bay EDC is already doing iniatives like the Thunder Bay Oil Sands Consortium according to Demming. “ We have over 22 companies representing 600 to 800 employers going after business in the tar sands of Alberta. We will be a service centre for Western Canada. These projects in Alberta and Manitoba are so huge in scale you have to be a
market savvy company. Suncor won’t deal with a 30 employee company but with a 800 staff consortium they will.”
“ Word will fly about the success of Superior Propane but we have to market ourselves. I think there are a lot of things already percolating here. The new announcements at the hospital with more doctors and scientists moving here are important. There are emerging IT companies, pulp and paper and mining companies like De Beers who are spending $1.2 billion on their project. The Thunder Bay airport is experiencing it’s highest traffic volume in years. Very positive things are happening in Thunder Bay.” smiles Steve Demming.
