The following list of corporate values reflects what is truly important
to ECL as an organization.
Customer-focused
We work hard to help our customers achieve their top performance every
day. We take pride in delivering extraordinary customer service and
products to our customers. When we set expectations with our customers
or our colleagues we execute for results.
Opportunity-driven
We constantly seek new opportunities and identify solutions for our
clients as well as ourselves. We love to compete and believe
competition brings out the best in all of us. Each employee plays a
vital role and is an important link in the chain of our success. We
focus where we passionately believe we can be the best.
Results-driven
We constantly drive for results and success without wavering from
our foundation which is built on trust, respect and integrity. We are
accountable for delivering high-quality service and products which are
continually enriched by open, dynamic lookbacks and learning.
Team-based
We know the best results are achieved when everyone works together
to achieve the same goal. We conduct our business with empathy,
compassion, collaboration and cooperation. Team work requires respect
among peers at all levels.
Safety and protection
This is a driving force in all our actions with the environment, our
property, our customers and each other. We protect each other from
harm, as well as our assets and intellectual property. We are committed
to benchmark practices in safety and environmental stewardship, ethical
business conduct, and community responsibility.
ECL Celebrates 60 Years of Driving Business
It was 1937 in southern Alberta and things were beginning to look up. After four years of devastating drought and economic depression, farmers in the region were once again growing grain and finding markets in which to sell it. It would be another 10 years before wildcatters would strike oil in Leduc and the province's economy was still deeply entrenched in agriculture.
Rumblings in Asia and Europe sent whispers of war over the Atlantic, but in the small town of Jefferson, Alberta, nestled against the Montana border, Emil Fredericks was busy contemplating things much closer to home. Being a homesteader and having worked as an agent with the United Farmers of Alberta (UFA), Emil's heart and soul had been poured into the agriculture business, but it was his entrepreneurial spirit that nudged him to take the next step and start his own business producing and transporting feed and other agricultural products to area farmers.
“Relationships have always been a key part of our business,” says Emil's son, Tom Fredericks, 70 years later from a boardroom in Calgary. “And our longstanding relationship began with UFA the day my father started Economy Feed and Transfer in 1937.” Eking out a living in the early years following the depression, Emil began to grow his business by providing not only exceptional service, but a deep knowledge and understanding of the agriculture business that allowed him to relate on a personal level with his customers. Things were going well until 1943 when a fire completely destroyed the company's facility in Jefferson. Emil decided to set up a new shop in nearby Cardston, which offered a larger market in which to do business.
In 1947, the Allies had claimed victory over the Nazis and Canadian boys were headed home looking for work. Emil's wife had three brothers, two of which were fresh out of the armed forces, one just out of high school and ready to earn a living. Harvey, Alvin and Harry Bietz joined forces with Emil Fredericks to form Economy Carriers Limited. The Bietz brothers set up shop in Calgary while Emil worked on the company's accounting and the business end from Cardston.
By the early 1950s, Economy Carriers was keeping the Bietz and Fredericks families fed and the owners busy. At that time, a friend of Emil's from Cardston, the owner of the local car dealership, was becoming frustrated with a lack of competition in the freight hauling business.(click here to read the full story)