People & Communities
Sustainability and
Responsibility
At a time when society needed companies to step up and use their unique capabilities for the greater good, Corby rose to the occasion.
Soon after the COVID-19 pandemic hit, teams from Corby and the Hiram Walker & Sons distillery in Windsor, where most of our Canadian production takes place, coordinated a plan with local and provincial government officials that would enable us to produce and donate hand sanitizer for people in greatest need.
By March 19, we had pivoted as needed to make hand sanitizer at the distillery. The first batch was delivered to the Village of Lake Aspen Nursing Home in Windsor, and an additional 1,000 litres were delivered to St. Joseph's Hospital and St. Michael's Hospital in Toronto. We committed to contributing up to 20,000 litres per week and the total amount reached 210,000 litres by the end of June. Hiram Walker also supplied significant volumes of much-needed alcohol to large manufacturers for their production of hand sanitizer.
Hiram Walker & Sons distillery produced and donated 210,000 litres of hand sanitizer for Canada’s frontline workers.
Meanwhile, our Ungava Spirits Co. also distributed hand sanitizer locally in Cowansville, Québec, and our Foreign Affair winery joined other wineries in Niagara to provide 2,000 bottles and screwcaps to assist in the distribution of locally produced disinfectant.
In this together
Many of our brands ran initiatives to support their consumers and communities. As a company, we also joined efforts to help on-premise customers and the estimated 800,000 bartenders, servers and kitchen staff put out of work when restaurants and bars closed across the country. Among them:
Bartenders Benevolent Fund
Corby and Diageo Canada partnered on a $100,000 donation to the Bartenders Benevolent Fund, which provides emergency assistance to front-of-house hospitality staff who have fallen under serious financial hardship.
WSET training for bartenders
We partnered with the Wine & Spirit Education Trust (WSET) to sponsor a free Level 1 Award in Spirits course for 1,500 bartenders to take while their bars were closed down. Successful students received a certificate and WSET lapel pin badge, both of which are widely recognized across the industry.
#stillopen
We launched the #stillopen campaign to connect Canadians to local takeout and delivery options in their area. At corby.ca/stillopen, restaurant lovers could find a list of geo-targeted restaurants and bars in British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Ontario, Québec, New Brunswick and Nova Scotia that were supporting their communities by offering delivery and takeout food as well as Corby products. The website also featured a contest where consumers could enter for a chance to win a $100 gift card for a restaurant near them.
