Our Story Begins Here
❊ About Us
BCause everyone deserves affordable groceries
BCause is a nonprofit organization based in Victoria, British Columbia that is on a mission to open Vancouver Island’s first nonprofit grocery store. BCause’s take on a traditional grocery store is designed to demonstrate a new model for food affordability, dignity, and community access. The organization intends to operate a full-service grocery store that is open to the public with no eligibility requirements.
At BCause, we believe grocery stores should exist to make food more accessible and affordable for everyone in the community. We believe access to nutritious food should be universal, not determined by income, circumstance, or barriers to entry.
BCause’s vision is made possible thanks to a team of dedicated and diverse staff, advisors and a board of directors with a diverse background in both nonprofits and the grocery industry. Combined, our team has decades of grocery knowledge that will help shape this new era of grocery retail.
The Problem
Food affordability has become a growing challenge for households across Canada. Rising grocery prices, combined with fixed incomes and wage stagnation, have created increasing pressure on families, seniors, students, and working households.
While food banks provide essential emergency support, they are primarily funded through donations and grants, which limits their capacity and requires them to focus on emergency-level food access. This can create barriers to consistent, dignified, everyday grocery access for households who are not in crisis but are still struggling with affordability.
This creates a structural gap between emergency food support and for-profit grocery retail: a lack of accessible, dignified, and consistently affordable everyday food access.
The Solution
BCause intends to address this gap by operating a nonprofit grocery store that combines retail efficiency with a charitable structure.
The store operates like a conventional grocery store, while its nonprofit structure ensures that surplus revenue is reinvested directly into lowering food costs and strengthening community food access.
BCause is a nonprofit grocery store first and foremost, designed to operate like a traditional store while reinvesting all surplus into community affordability. This model allows BCause to maintain a familiar shopping experience while unlocking charitable funding, partnerships, and community support that reduce operational pressures and improve affordability.
The System is Broken
The grocery industry in Canada is comprised of 5 major players: Loblaws, Sobeys, Metro, Walmart and Costco. These five retailers make up 75% of all grocery locations in the country. These monopolies have led to a food system without enough competition leading to higher overall grocery prices and an illusion of choice in the marketplace.
Pictured below just some of the retail subsidiaries of the leading grocery monopolies.
The Big 5 Dominate the Market
1/3 kids are food insecure
More families than ever are experiencing food insecurity across Canada. The rising costs of living has left no province or territory unaffected. Percentage change of total visits to Canadian Food Banks from 2019 - 2025 saw a 99.4% increase.
It’s time for a change.
