About

The in-house legal team of Canadian conglomerate Empire is led by Doug Nathanson in his role of senior vice president, general counsel and corporate secretary, and is comprised of top industry lawyers in the food retail sector. Headquartered in Stellarton, Nova Scotia, Empire is an investment company focused on food retail and related real estate, and holds a market-leading position as one of the top two largest food retail financers in Canada. Employing 120,000 people, earning C$24.6bn in annual sales and holding C$8.7bn in assets, its food business is run through its wholly owned subsidiary, Sobeys, one of the country’s largest food retail chains with over 1,500 locations. In addition, Nathanson is the general counsel, senior vice president and corporate secretary of Sobeys. Empire also has a large investment portfolio with accounted interest in Crombie REIT and other equity interests in residential real estate through Grenstar. In the past year the legal team has made a significant contribution to the company’s growth, such as through the acquisition of Farm Boy, a fast-growing new food retailer in Ontario for C$800m, as well as signing an agreement with Ocado Group to bring its online shopping delivery service
to Canada.