McCain Foods

McCain Foods Limited is a Canadian multinational frozen food company established in 1957 in Florenceville, New Brunswick, Canada.^[2]

McCain Foods Limited

Company type	Private
Industry	Frozen food
Founded	Florenceville, New Brunswick, Canada (1957)
Founders	Harrison McCain Wallace McCain
Headquarters	439 King Street West, 5th Floor, Toronto, Ontario , Canada
Area served	Worldwide
Key people	James Scott McCain – Chairman Max Koeune – President and CEO of McCain Foods Limited Danielle Barran – President of McCain Foods (Canada)
Products	French fries, appetizers, vegetables, desserts, entrees, and oven meals
Revenue	$14 billion CAD (2023)
Number of employees	20,000 (2023)[1]
Website	mccain.com

It is the world's largest manufacturer of frozen potato products, with 1 in 4 french fries in the world being a McCain fry.^[3] Its major competitors are Simplot and Lamb Weston.^[4][5]

History

A plate with McCain Smiles, a face-shaped mashed potato bite.

McCain Foods was co-founded in 1957 by brothers Harrison McCain and Wallace McCain with the help of their two older brothers.^[6][7]

In their first year of production, the company hired 30 employees and grossed over $150,000 in sales.^[8][6] During the 1970s–1990s, the company expanded into additional prepared food markets including frozen pizza and vegetables.^[9]

As of 2017, the company is the world's largest manufacturer of frozen potato products, and has over 20,000 employees and 47 production facilities in six continents. The company generates more than $8.5 billion in annual sales.^[10]

Based on 2014 sales, it is the 19th largest private company in Canada, according to The Globe and Mail's Report on Business.^[11] Nancy McCain, of the McCain family, is married to former Canadian Finance Minister Bill Morneau.^[12] In 2020, McCain Foods won the Lausanne Index Prize – Best of Packaging.^[13]

In 2024, McCain Foods was named into class action lawsuits along with Cavendish Farms, Lamb Weston and J.R. Simplot in a conspiracy to coordinate prices on frozen potatoes. The four firms, which control 98% of the potato market in the United States, are alleged to have co-ordinated price increases starting in 2021.^[14]

UK operations

McCain Foods' UK subsidiary has a factory in Scarborough, North Yorkshire; the subsidiary sponsored the former football stadium in the town until the football team was dissolved on June 20, 2007.^[15] There is also a plant at Whittlesey, Cambridgeshire, and a cold store in Easton, Lincolnshire.^{[citation needed]}

A legal case in which McCain Foods (GB) Ltd sued Eco-Tec (Europe) Ltd. was decided by the High Court in 2011. McCain had ordered a system intended to remove hydrogen sulphide from biogas produced in its waste water treatment plant, which would allow the gas to produce power and heat for the Whittlesey plant. The system proved to be "impossible to commission successfully" and so McCain sued for compensation. The court's ruling confirmed that Eco-Tec were in breach of their contract.^{[16][non-primary source needed]} Legally, the court took a broadly inclusive approach to the scope of the losses incurred by McCain and the damages due to them, declining to treat a number of items as "consequential losses" for which Eco-Tec sought protection under a contractual exclusion clause.^{[17][non-primary source needed]}