PDAC ripe for generating deals: Mining Supply Showcase opens up opportunity for Northern businesses.

• Author: Kelly, Lindsay
• Position: Mining

Somewhere in Greenland, there's a mining industry representative walking around wearing a toque with Larabie Logistics emblazoned across it.

With temperatures still dipping below zero in early March, the giveaways handed out by the Kapuskasing-based hauling company proved just the right tool to attract visitors to its booth during the 2015 Prospectors and Developers Association of Canada (PDAC) trade show in Toronto.

Now, president Denis Larabie is hopeful the next time that mining rep needs help hauling materials and goods in North America, he'll remember the toque, and the ensuing conversation, and consider Larabie Logistics.

"We're a small company, so we're not a 3,000-truck company," he said. "We don't have the marketing bucks and we don't have the exposure or the PR of these people, or the connections."

But he does have the knowhow and experience: Larabie Logistics worked on the $2.3-billion Lower Mattagami hydroelectric project, completed earlier this year, as part of a joint venture with Cree Carriers JV, and was the exclusive logistics provider during the development of De Beers' $ 1.3-billion Victor diamond mine, completed in 2008, in another joint venture project with Creewest Logistics.

PDAC, held March 1-4, attracted 23,500 attendees from 116 countries. More than 60 Northern Ontario businesses and organizations exhibited in the Northern Ontario Mining Supply Showcase, the second year for the pavilion.

For Larabie, a first-time PDAC attendee, the opportunities to create new contacts were invaluable.

"It was mind-boggling the mining companies that were there with all their booths and promotional stuff," he said. "It was very, very impressive for me."

Brenda Hagerty has been attending PDAC for 15 years, but with booth space in such demand, she's only ever had the opportunity to walk the floor.

This year, for the first time, Hagerty was able to secure a booth for Porcupine Canvas after PDAC opened up the north building of the facility to new exhibitors as part of the Northern Ontario Mining Supply Showcase.

"It's a good thing we got in there year one, because the north building is full," she said. "There are no more booths left; people are back on a waiting list."

Participation this year definitely paid off for Porcupine Canvas, which makes canvas tents, bags and cases geared toward the mining industry from its manufacturing facility in Timmins.

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