VG Gourmet, a kosher Montreal based company launched in 2015, is now able to expand due to an injection of finance from the Canadian federal government. Canada is rated by Google trends as the 5th to the top of the worlds’ most vegan-friendly countries according to Plant-Based News, and is also a major player in the global explosion of plant-based foods.
An announcement on Facebook reads: “VG Gourmet has been chosen as the recipient of a $100,000 grant from the Women’s Entrepreneurship Fund, financed by the Government of Canada!! This will help our company export all of our yummy vegan and gluten-free products by purchasing new equipment to modernize our facility!”
The funding comes from the $20-million Women’s Entrepreneurship Fund, which was created last year and is administered by the Ministry of Small Business and Export Promotion.
Husband-and-wife team Emmanuel Castiel and Chantal Bekhor created VG Gourmet from scratch. It now has ten employees who make seven different plant-based burgers and other meat replacement foods, including beet balls, crumbles and tofu creations which are available in over 700 retail locations across Canada.
The company is certified by the Toronto-based Kashruth Council of Canada, which uses the COR heksher.
