The Food Centre’s line of expertise include ingredient, food and process development, interim processing, extrusion, skills development, food safety education and training, quality assurance, technology transfer and path-finding. The Food Centre’s federally inspected processing facilities are Saskatchewan’s only commercial incubation Centre for food processing.
Our wide range of services cater to any sized agri-business, from entrepreneurs and SMEs to multi-national companies. We customize our services to suit your business needs.
Do you have a product idea? Are you interested in entering the plant-based food market? Are you looking to expand your market and require scale-up processing? Follow these steps and we’ll do our best to match our expertise to your business needs.
Step 1
Fill out our online Prospective Client Form. The questionnaire provides the Food Centre with details about your product idea and will assist us in tailoring our services to move your project forward. Project confidentiality is important to us.
Step 2
Once submitted, please allow a few days for our staff to review your material. A Food Centre staff will be in contact with you by phone or email to arrange the initial meeting or conference call with some of our experts. Let’s chat to see if, when, and how we can assist you in bringing your idea to market!
Step 3
The first meeting is a discussion of your product idea, business objectives and identifying what Food Centre services are needed for your project. Please be prepared with detailed information on your project. Clients are encouraged to bring/show prototype(s), competitor’s product, packaging suggestions, etc to this initial meeting. At this point we’ll be able to determine if it’s something we can develop and/or produce.
Step 4
We will provide some “next steps” for you to get started. For example: Do you have a formulation and processing procedures? If so, your formulation and processing procedures will be reviewed to confirm that it’s something the Food Centre can produce using our equipment. Project conversations will start with our Production Team to set up a scale-up test.
However, if you only have a recipe and cooking instructions, then further conversations may be needed with our Product Development Team to review scale-up viability. We want to make sure that the recipe translates smoothly in our scale-up test using commercial equipment. This step is critical to ensure a consistent product and will save you money and time in the long run.
Step 5 – ready to start!
Once it’s clear what services you need from the Food Centre, a (product development and/or processing) contract will be drafted outlining estimated cost of services and potential timelines for the project.
Food Processors Guide
Check out our “Food Processors Guide”, a step-by-step guide to getting started in the food processing industry. The guide provides a brief and concise overview of the food processing industry and how to start up a food processing company on your own.
Get Started