Bimbo Canada

Leslee Wills

As the VP of people and corporate affairs at Bimbo Canada, I understand that ethics and culture are intrinsically linked, shaping the foundation of a successful organization. Ethics serve as the guiding force fostering an environment that values integrity and transparency in decision-making and behaviors.

Since Bimbo Canada (formerly Canada Bread was acquired by Grupo Bimbo in 2014, I have personally witnessed how acting with integrity can transform a company’s culture first-hand and accelerate the capability of doing purpose-driven work. And, in a global context, where diverse perspectives and practices converge, adhering to a strong ethical framework becomes even more crucial.

Grupo Bimbo’s global commitment to integrity has earned us recognition as one of the ‘world’s most ethical companies’ by Ethisphere (a global ethical standard-setting agency) for the seventh year in a row. Our commitment to ethics helps us unite associates worldwide, fostering respect, fairness, trust, and care to ensure that we treat others the way we would like to be treated as a business and as human beings.

As leaders and associates representing 34 countries, we operate with consistent beliefs and ethics in each jurisdiction. At Bimbo Canada, we embrace our people-first culture, which emphasizes the safety, well-being, growth, and development of associates, acknowledging their diverse backgrounds and perspectives. We empower our associates to be good neighbors, advocates of our sustainability vision, and to make meaningful contributions to society at large, embracing a ‘give more and take less’ approach.

"At Bimbo Canada, we embrace our people-first culture, which emphasizes the safety, well-being, growth, and development of associates, acknowledging their diverse backgrounds and perspectives."

Ethics and culture go deeper at Grupo Bimbo. We strive to emulate the principle of servant leadership, that is, embracing the privilege and responsibility to serve the greater good of humanity, both as individuals and as an organization. This is one of the distinctly Grupo Bimbo characteristics – recognizing that great servant-leader organizations can and will change the world for the better. In the words of Robert Greenleaf, who coined the term servant leadership more than half a century ago, “This is my thesis: caring for persons, the more able and the less able serving each other, is the rock upon which a good society is built.”

Community Engagement

At the center of our beliefs, we ‘value the person.’ All of our corporate community giving initiatives in Canada are local and built to enrich the communities where we live and work. In 2022, Bimbo Canada contributed almost $7 million to communities in product and financial donations, including more than 2.8 million units of bread and snacks to 155 food bank organizations across the country.

Each of our bakeries and sales centers leads Good Neighbour projects annually in their local community, and these initiatives are associate driven. Last year alone, 26 projects and $150,000 supported local organizations to address food insecurity, mental and physical well-being, and improvements to the environment.

In 2022, Bimbo Canada launched three different employer-sponsored volunteer programs to encourage our associates to support organizations they care deeply about in their communities, both on work time and in their personal lives.  

Ethics and Integrity in Everything We Do

As Canada’s largest and oldest bakery, we are staunch advocates of aligning ethics and culture with our global organizational purpose of nourishing a better world.  

Since our acquisition by Grupo Bimbo in 2014, we have successfully embedded both the global code of ethics and global organizational beliefs into our Canadian operations, emphasizing integrity as a cornerstone of how we do business. Integrating ethics and beliefs ensures consistency across our global operations, promotes seamless international collaboration and communication, and establishes clear expectations for how we conduct ourselves around the world. This way of working, coupled with our commitment to servant leadership, is part of our identity and represents who Bimbo Canada is today and who we will continue to be for decades to come.  

Taking stock of what you stand for and how you want to show up in the world is crucial for a purpose-driven organization. Together, we have built a company grounded in people-first culture, incomparable ethics, and unimpeachable integrity. Supported by a globally admired organization, enduring brands, and a world-class supply chain, Bimbo Canada works hard to generate value for our shareholders, trust with our customers, and the loyalty of the Canadians we nourish every day.