Zahir Keshavjee is just chilled about living the Canadian dream and achieving the cream of success by tapping into our tastebuds.

"This is a land where we celebrate our ethnic and cultural differences and similarities," says the vice-president of sales and marketing for Tropical Treets, a maker of gourmet and tropical ice creams and juices, which is based in a cool 10,000-sq.-ft. manufacturing plant in Scarborough. "Business is recognizing that fact and waking up to the vast possibilities our diversity offers."

Keshavjee is among a new breed of entrepreneurs known as ethno-marketers.

Over the past 23 years, Keshavjee's family-owned enterprise has grown to include offices in Ottawa, Montreal, Winnipeg, Calgary, Halifax and a new location in Vancouver to service more than 2,000 restaurants and ethnic, specialty and gourmet foodstores across the country.

Ken Kerr, Business Edge
Tropical Treets vice-president Zahir Keshavjee says businesses need to recognize the possibilities of diversity.

Tropical Treets sources ingredients from around the world to produce an international flavour array that includes mango, guanabana, goyabe, lulo, mora and maracoya.

"Not long ago Italian and Mexican foods were considered exotic foods by many," Keshavjee says. "But because Toronto consumers like to experiment with their cuisine, what starts out as an ethnic food eventually becomes mainstream."

Mirroring the message is Keith Chen, president of Toronto-based Culinary Destinations, which has steadily kneaded a national profile with such appetizers as vegetable, chicken and shrimp spring-rolls, mini tacos, burritos and samosas sold as private-label brands at Loblaws and Sobeys supermarkets and food-service distributors.

"We have an interesting marketplace, one that allows us to make and sell innovative produce with overseas origins that have found a home here," says Chen, who is of Chinese ancestry and hails from India.

"When we founded the company eight years ago, our East Indian-inspired products were ahead of the curve, considered by retailers as a niche market. It was a tough sell then, but as awareness of, and appreciation for, ethnic food has grown among consumers, so, too, have they embraced these delightful taste sensations," Chen says.

Walk any Toronto street, or scan its 79 ethnic newspapers, or pop into any foodstore, and it is clear that the city straddles the world.

With a population of more than 2.5 million people (five million in the Greater Toronto Area) and boasting more than 100 languages and dialects spoken within its perimeters (more than one-third of the city's residents speak a language other than English at home) Toronto is heralded as the globe's most multiculturally eclectic metropolis.

About 49 per cent of the city's population today was born outside Canada, while new immigrants represent 21 per cent of Toronto's demographic mosaic.

When India's largest private-sector bank, ICICI Bank (with a market capitalization of about $7 billion US), decided to launch its Canadian operations in January 2003, Toronto was "a logical springboard," says Canadian president and CEO Hari Panday.

With 917,000 South Asians now calling Canada home - and that number forecast to reach almost two million by 2017 - ICICI Bank Canada is bent on cranking up the idea of diversity in business a few decibels.

Keith Chen

Since its arrival on Bay Street, the 50-year-old institution has opened branches in Brampton, Scarborough, downtown Toronto and in June in the city's Little India neighbourhood on Gerrard Street - all strategically sited in immigrant-heavy areas.

"Rather than segregating our operation along ethnic lines (most other institutions have designated ethnic branches), our goal is to bring Canada's multicultural fabric under one roof," Panday says, adding that the bank takes a two-pronged approach to diversity.

"First, creating it in-house by staffing our branches with people who reflect the community in which they're located," he says, pointing out there are 17 different languages spoken among the Toronto ICICI branches.

"Next, we looked outside to explore the demography of the communities we serve. The goal: Position ourselves not just as an Indian financial institution, but as the premier South Asian bank in the country."

With more than 20,000 accounts signed up from across the country (many out-of-province customers use the bank's online services), ICICI plans further expansion through advertising campaigns in the ethnic media, targeting Asian and Chinese publications. For personal banking, ABMs at every branch feature language options in English, French, Hindi, Punjabi and Chinese.

The bank's latest initiative, Hello Canada, is a newcomer's account that allows those from South Asia, the Middle East or the United Kingdom who are approved to work, study or live in Canada to open savings accounts and get approval for credit lines, credit cards and home mortgages before emigrating to Canada.

"This helps people to have their finances set up for them prior to arriving, which limits the hassles they face when setting up their new life in Canada," Panday says.

And because he has seen ICICI's non-Indo-Canadian customer base swell to 38 per cent of overall business, Panday believes his bank is catering to the evolution of the mainstream.

Ole Jensen, an expert in international transportation and logistics, agrees.

As director of business development for Mississauga-based AMJ Campbell Van Lines, one of Canada's largest moving companies, Jensen detected a gap in the Canadian marketplace that his trucks could readily fill.

With the Filipino community blossoming around the GTA (currently more than 140,000 people), Jensen saw business-generating opportunities.

"Many coming from the Philippines still have most of their families back home," Jensen says. "The idea of sending parcels to the Philippines at reasonable rates was suggested to me by my wife, who is Filipino.

"I did five months of groundwork, visiting the Philippines several times to see if the concept was feasible. It was and we've been doing a booming business ever since."

Ten years after its first batch of parcelled goods was sent by Canadian Filipinos, the $140-million company offers shipments (with no weight restrictions and delivery times of up to eight weeks) to Manila and the provinces of Luzon, Mindanao and Visayas for as little as $65.

Jensen says he is amazed by what people can cram into the 6.45-cu.-ft. boxes his company supplies - everything from clothing, coffee and chocolate bars to motorcycle parts.

"With goods being significantly cheaper to buy in Toronto and ship to the Philippines, many people are opting to send goods instead of cash to their loved ones overseas," he says.

Using Campbell's trucks as freight-forwarders costs the company little since it already transports across the country and around the world, but the returns from the value-added service in terms of incremental revenue, goodwill with the community and potential moving business down the road are enormous, Jensen says.

Canada's ethnic blend signals new blessings for savvy ethno-marketers, says Yuen Pau Woo, vice-president of research and chief economist for Vancouver-based Asia Pacific Foundation of Canada, a non-profit independent resource organization focusing on Asia and Canada-Asia relations.

"The visible minority in most urban areas is quickly becoming the majority," Woo says. "Accessing the language, skills and knowledge of this growing labour force, that brings with it overseas contacts and links to foreign markets, is a decided asset to any forward-thinking Canadian enterprise - be it importing goods or exporting to other countries. It's a win-win situation for everyone."

Marketing to Ethnic Communities

* Know who your customers are by demographic and consumer behaviour profile. The money spent on well-run focus groups may save you from costly mistakes later if you plan to launch a major campaign.

* Communicate with your customers through their cultural media and events. Check out the local ethnic newspapers - they are a wealth of knowledge in identifying other businesses run by and/or serving that community.

* Implement your ethnic strategies by selection of sales staff, products and services to meet the community's specific needs and desires.

* Be easy to communicate with. Consider having at least the first page of your website offered in the target language. Create a flier, or have an existing one translated into your target language. Take advantage of whatever language skills are available to you by putting them to work in your direct-mail pieces and other printed marketing materials.

* Participate in community-based organizations and events so people get a chance to know you face-to-face. Associations serving a single ethnic community can also be great resources if they are open to you.

* Successful ethno-marketing focuses on getting four things right: - Picking the right geography, or studying an area where the relationship of the market to the retailer creates opportunity.

- Picking the right category segments, or drilling down to the appropriate category/brand level to identify opportunities among items that are important to your consumers.

- Picking the right marketing mix, or putting together the right product with the right promotion to create a winning ethnic brand.

- Picking the right execution strategy for the right place, or knowing how to reach the consumer you seek in the store where he or she shops.

(Jack Kohane can be reached at kohane@businessedge.ca)