Heavy lifting spurs Whiteriver Logistics growth

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This article was published 10/04/2024 (558 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

When Raj Sekhon immigrated to Winnipeg from Dubai in 2008, he did so as immigrant investor, with the intention of leveraging his family experience in the trucking business.

He started Whiteriver Logistics in 2008, with one truck.

In 2022, the company acquired an 111/2-acre site in Brookport Business Park and built a 20,000-square-foot warehouse.

It has now acquired a second, larger site (16 acres) on the other side of CentrePort Canada Way, where construction is beginning on a 50,000-sq.-ft. hub.

“That will be phase one and we’ll build another 50,000-square-foot building later,” Sekhon said Wednesday.

After $30 million of investment in real estate holdings, the company now runs 90 trucks with about 120 trailers and has strong relationships with a number of Manitoba manufacturers, handling heavy equipment and difficult materials.

The company has developed particularly strong relationships in the aerospace business. It’s now moving aircraft engines all over North America, including to the cold-weather testing facility in Thompson.

“Business has been growing. We’re feeling good about things. Everything is going well, so we are expanding,” said Sekhon.

The native of India moved to Dubai in his early 20s to help with his father’s trucking business, which he eventually took over.

That business was much smaller than Whiteriver, but it, too, had relationships with the aerospace industry and international shipping companies. Sekhon leveraged those contacts in establishing his Winnipeg company; the Dubai business was sold in 2013.

“The travelling back and forth was becoming too much,” he said.

Sekhon continues to count some of the roughly one dozen international steamship lines as customers.

Whiteriver’s specialization has led it to taking on tough jobs handling heavy equipment. It has forklifts and machines that can lift up to 50 tons, with another piece of equipment on order able to lift and stack shipping containers five high.

The logistics side of the business, including indoor and outdoor storage facilities, means Whiteriver can offer a full line of services.

Aaron Dolyniuk, executive director of the Manitoba Trucking Association, said although Whiteriver has yet to become a member of the MTA, it has established a solid reputation in the industry. (Sekhon said his company is in the process of becoming an MTA member.)

“Originally, I was thinking of selling the business, but my boys said they wanted to continue it,” Sekhon said.

His two sons, in their early 20s, are now actively involved in the business, as well as Sekhon’s brother and nephew.

Whiteriver is also now partnered with another, slightly larger firm, RoadStar Trucking, of Milton, Ont.

Sekhon has been friends with the owner of RoadStar for 20 years.

“He was thinking of growing into Manitoba. We talked and decided to do a partnership and grow the business,” said Sekhon.

RoadStar now owns 50 per cent of Whiteriver. The two companies are in different businesses, with RoadStar running dry vans and refrigerated trucks and Whiteriver operating flatbeds, hopper bottom and walking floor trailers.

The two companies now pass work to each other for their respective customers, depending on the service required.

“I give Whiteriver a lot of credit. It has been a wild ride for the trucking sector with massive scale-up during the pandemic and now other changes affecting the amount of freight moving. They’ve been nimble, received an investment in a new partnership and now invested in new operations to expand. They have navigated really well through a challenging time,” said Carly Edmundson, CEO of CentrePort Canada.

Whiteriver joins a growing number of CentrePort tenants who have invested in expansion after original construction just a couple of years ago.

“Many acquire property that allow for the potential for expansion. They want to make sure they have what they need right now but have the potential for room to grow,” Edmundson said.

Whiteriver was not able to expand its current location in Brookport Business Park because all its land is sold out.

Whiteriver’s new site is in the InksPort Business Park. Both of industrial parks have been developed by Whiteland Developers, also owned by new Canadians from India. One of the new streets built in Brookport is named Punjab Drive.

“We’re thrilled to see cultural diversity playing a role in the development of CentrePort. I think that’s excellent. It makes for a strong development,” Edmundson said.

martin.cash@freepress.mb.ca