How 100km Foods Built Ontario's Leading Local Food Distribution Network

When Paul Sawtell and Grace Mandarano sat in a community discussion about local food in the fall of 2007, they heard the same complaint from two sides. Chefs wanted local ingredients but couldn't source them; farmers wanted to sell to restaurants but couldn't make the economics work. The problem wasn't supply or demand — it was the logistics gap between them.

One of them scribbled "100km Foods?" on a napkin. Sawtell and Mandarano had no logistics experience, no warehouse, and no trucks. But they did have an idea that addressed a real friction point in the food system.

Almost two decades later, that napkin sketch has become Ontario's leading local food distributor, connecting more than 100 farms and producers with over 500 restaurants, hotels, and retailers across the whole of the Greater Toronto Area and Ontario's "Golden Horseshoe" region.

From pharmaceutical sales to farm-to-table logistics

Before 100km Foods, Sawtell and Mandarano worked corporate jobs in the pharmaceutical industry. Both took time away from work to travel through Asia, and returned certain they didn't want to go back to corporate life. 100km Foods answered the question of what they could do instead.

"If we were selling widgets, we would have quit. But this was something we really believed in." — Paul Sawtell, Edible Toronto (2016)

In the beginning, the business model was straightforward: Take orders from chefs on Thursdays, manually collate them over the weekend, purchase from farmers on Mondays, and deliver to restaurants on Tuesdays. The first delivery went to Anthony Walsh at Canoe, one of Oliver & Bonacini's flagship restaurants.

The founders built relationships by visiting chefs personally, understanding their needs, and figuring out what products they could source locally. They positioned themselves as "the communicator between chef and farmer because the two don't always speak the same language."

100km Foods serves a specific niche: farmers who are "too big for a farm stand and too little for Sysco."

Scaling the operation: From 2 trucks to 10+

The early model, with manual order collation and limited delivery capacity, made it hard to scale. Grants from the Friends of the Greenbelt Foundation made the difference:

• A 2011 grant doubled their fleet from two trucks to four, enabling them to reach more suppliers and customers.
• A second round in 2013 doubled their fleet again to eight trucks.

This fleet growth didn't just extend 100km Foods' reach, it also meant they could upgrade their offering. They now had enough trucks to pick up products from farms in multiple regions in Southern Ontario and deliver to restaurants the next day — meaning food could go from harvest to kitchen in 24 hours.

"Being able to work with a lot more farms was paramount to bringing more produce to market." — Paul Sawtell

Today, 100km Foods operates 10 delivery trucks and employs around 25 staff, including warehouse workers, drivers, sales, and operations teams. In the high season, they are scheduling up to 150 deliveries per day, with a downtown Toronto route having up to 25–30 stops.

The logistics challenge: Coordinating farms and restaurants

100km Foods operates a complex logistics operation with several moving parts:

• Daily farm pickups: Drivers run four separate farm routes to collect produce harvested to order from farms across Southern Ontario. About 95% of their produce comes from within 100 kilometers of Toronto (hence the name), though they've expanded slightly to source year-round.
• Tight order windows: Chefs must place orders before 5am to get next-day delivery.
• Same-day processing: Products arrive at their North York warehouse and are sorted for delivery overnight, often heading out to restaurants the day after they were picked.
• Multiple delivery regions: 100km Foods delivers to Toronto and four other regions: Kitchener-Cambridge-Waterloo to the west, Niagara Falls to the south, Barrie/Orillia/Muskoka to the north and Prince Edward County to the east.
• Daily vs weekly routing: There are 12 distinct delivery areas managed by geography, with dedicated delivery days. 100km Foods delivers to customers in the dense downtown Toronto core six days a week, and to customers further away once or twice a week.
• Seasonal variation: Product availability shifts dramatically by season. The team maintains relationships with farmers who use storage capacity and hoop houses to extend local availability year-round.

Before Routific, 100km Foods managed its routes using Excel spreadsheets. They "were far from optimized," notes Sawtell. "With Routific, we have the confidence that routes and trucks are optimized and that our customers' delivery windows are respected."

Building a values-driven food system

100km Foods operates as a Certified B Corporation, ranking in the top 10% of B Corps worldwide for community impact for four consecutive years. This isn't a marketing veneer — it's embedded in their operations.

• Farmers set their own prices: Unlike traditional distribution models where the distributor dictates terms, 100km Foods lets farmers determine what their products are worth. This attracts quality-focused producers who might otherwise avoid wholesale channels.
• Source identification on every product: Every item is traced to its specific farm or producer. When a chef receives peaches, they know exactly who grew them. This transparency helps to build relationships between chefs and farmers.
• Community partnerships: 100km Foods partners with organizations like The Stop Community Food Centre, transporting produce from local farm partners for use in their community food programming.

The Certified 100km program: Extending the mission

In 2019, 100km Foods launched a "Certified 100km" accreditation program to answer a question they kept hearing from the public: "Where should I eat if I want to support local food?"

The program validates restaurants, hotels, retailers, and community organizations as local food champions based on their purchasing commitment. Current certified partners include some of Toronto's most acclaimed establishments: 360 Restaurant at the CN Tower, Café Boulud at the Four Seasons, BUCA, Park Hyatt Toronto, and Richmond Station.

"When choosing a location for a meal, guests rightly take into account the values of the restaurant. Having the 100km Certification allows guests to know which restaurants are actually putting their money where their mouth is in terms of purchasing local foods." — Chef John Morris, 360 Restaurant

Lessons for scaling a food distribution business

100km Foods' journey from napkin sketch to Ontario's leading local food distributor offers several insights:

1. Solve a real coordination problem: The founders didn't invent demand for local food; they built infrastructure that made it easier to meet the demand.
2. Invest in fleet capacity strategically: Each truck expansion unlocked new suppliers, new customers, and new operational capabilities (like next-day delivery).
3. Let values attract partners: B Corp certification and fair farmer pricing attract quality-focused farms and values-aligned restaurants, creating a reinforcing network effect.
4. Build relationships, not just transactions: Source identification and direct chef-farmer connections create loyalty that commoditized distribution can't match.

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