Ottawa

Retail giant Costco Ottawa’s top revenue-generating firm in new list

June 18, 2021

A big-box retail giant and an e-commerce colossus are among the locally headquartered companies appearing on a newly released list of Canada’s 500 largest corporations by revenue.

Costco Wholesale Canada Ltd. was the top Ottawa-based firm on the FP500, a ranking of the country’s largest companies by revenue published by the Financial Post Magazine this week. The annual list includes publicly traded firms, private companies, Crown corporations and subsidiaries of foreign corporations.

Costco’s Canadian subsidiary posted revenues of $30.2 billion (all figures in Canadian dollars) in 2020, up 6.6 per cent from a year earlier, according to FP’s latest list. The membership-based retailer moved up four spots to No. 13 in the new rankings, 12 positions back of overall leader Brookfield Asset Management of Toronto, which recorded revenues of $82.1 billion.

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A total of 14 Ottawa-based companies made this year’s rankings. Not surprisingly, the capital’s contingent was weighted heavily toward Crown corporations, which accounted for half of the entrants.

The biggest year-over-year revenue gainer among local companies is e-commerce powerhouse Shopify, which rose five spots to No. 60 after seeing revenues skyrocket 88 per cent to $3.9 billion compared with fiscal 2019.

The Ottawa-headquartered software company, which builds and maintains online storefronts for more than 1.7 million merchants worldwide, surpassed RBC as Canada’s most valuable publicly traded company in 2020 as demand for its products surged during the pandemic.

Local companies making their first appearance on the list included Kanata-based tech firm Calian Group, which jumped 58 spots to land at No. 482, and Smiths Falls cannabis giant Canopy Growth, which sneaked on to the list at No. 499 and just missing out on the top 500 last year.

“It is an honour for Calian to be recognized by FP Magazine alongside iconic Canadian companies,” Calian chief executive Kevin Ford said in a statement.

Here is the complete list of local companies on this year’s FP500, along with their overall ranking and 2020 revenues:

13. Costco Canada ($30.2 billion, up 6.6%)

55. Canada Post ($8.9 billion, up 2.6%)

60. Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp. ($8.1 billion, up 5.5%)

123. Shopify ($3.9 billion, up 87.6%)

180. Export Development Canada ($2.3 billion, down 18.5%)

182. Bank of Canada ($2.3 billion, up 13.1%)

251. Royal Canadian Mint ($1.5 billion, up 2.3%)

283. Hydro Ottawa ($1.2 billion, up 3.5%)

312. Nav Canada ($1 billion, down 30.4%)

353. Telesat Canada ($820.5 million, down 9.9%)

368. Canada Deposit Insurance Corp. ($753.9 million, up 6%)