In this episode of The Food Professor Podcast , Michael LeBlanc and Sylvain Charlebois explore diverse food industry topics. The show kicks off with a conversation about Texas barbecue, featuring Chuck Charnichart, also known as BBQ Rat, the young, award-winning pitmaster of Barb’s BQ. Her journey from working at Texas' top barbecue spots to launching her own critically acclaimed restaurant is highlighted. The discussion then shifts to economic and trade challenges, particularly rising beef prices. Charlebois explains how droughts, shrinking herds, and producer exits have driven beef prices to record highs, with Canada’s cattle population at its lowest since 1987. Egg prices are also soaring in the U.S. due to avian flu, with millions of birds culled. However, Canada’s supply management system has helped stabilize prices domestically. The hosts also touch on Amazon’s decision to close its Quebec warehouses, raising concerns about the company's impact on the grocery and retail sectors. Trade tensions between Canada and the U.S. are another key topic, with tariffs, multilateralism, and political uncertainty under scrutiny. The episode wraps up with lighter topics, including Dubai chocolate, a rising trend in the global confectionery market. LeBlanc praises Canadian retailer Showcase for identifying and capitalizing on this trend early. The hosts reflect on Canada’s position in global agrifood rankings, highlighting issues in food processing, capital shortages, and supply chain inefficiencies. MNP Study https://www.dal.ca/sites/agri-food/research/most-influential-nations.html Barb's B.Q. https://www.barbsbq.com/ Franklin's BBQ https://franklinbbq.com/ The Food Professor #podcast is presented by Caddle. About Us Dr. Sylvain Charlebois is a Professor in food distribution and policy in the Faculties of Management and Agriculture at Dalhousie University in Halifax. He is also the Senior Director of the Agri-food Analytics Lab, also located at Dalhousie University. Before joining Dalhousie, he was affiliated with the University of Guelph’s Arrell Food Institute, which he co-founded. Known as “The Food Professor”, his current research interest lies in the broad area of food distribution, security and safety. Google Scholar ranks him as one of the world's most cited scholars in food supply chain management, food value chains and traceability. He has authored five books on global food systems, his most recent one published in 2017 by Wiley-Blackwell entitled “Food Safety, Risk Intelligence and Benchmarking”. He has also published over 500 peer-reviewed journal articles in several academic publications. Furthermore, his research has been featured in several newspapers and media groups, including The Lancet, The Economist, the New York Times, the Boston Globe, the Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, BBC, NBC, ABC, Fox News, Foreign Affairs, the Globe & Mail, the National Post and the Toronto Star. Dr. Charlebois sits on a few company boards, and supports many organizations as a special advisor, including some publicly traded companies. Charlebois is also a member of the Scientific Council of the Business Scientific Institute, based in Luxemburg. Dr. Charlebois is a member of the Global Food Traceability Centre’s Advisory Board based in Washington DC, and a member of the National Scientific Committee of the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) in Ottawa. Michael LeBlanc is the president and founder of M.E. LeBlanc & Company Inc, a senior retail advisor, keynote speaker and now, media entrepreneur. He has been on the front lines of retail industry change for his entire career. Michael has delivered keynotes, hosted fire-side discussions and participated worldwide in thought leadership panels, most recently on the main stage in Toronto at Retail Council of Canada’s Retail Marketing conference with leaders from Walmart & Google. He brings 25+ years of brand/retail/marketing & eCommerce leadership experience with Levi's, Black & Decker, Hudson's Bay, CanWest Media, Pandora Jewellery, The Shopping Channel and Retail Council of Canada to his advisory, speaking and media practice. Michael produces and hosts a network of leading retail trade podcasts, including the award-winning No.1 independent retail industry podcast in America, Remarkable Retail with his partner, Dallas-based best-selling author Steve Dennis; Canada's top retail industry podcast The Voice of Retail and Canada's top food industry and one of the top Canadian-produced management independent podcasts in the country, The Food Professor with Dr. Sylvain Charlebois from Dalhousie University in Halifax. Rethink Retail has recognized Michael as one of the top global retail experts for the fourth year in a row, Thinkers 360 has named him on of the Top 50 global thought leaders in retail, RTIH has named him a top 100 global though leader in retail technology and Coresight Research has named Michael a Retail AI Influencer. If you are a BBQ fan, yo
