Vancouver Island Salt Co.

Vancouver Island Salt Co. (VISC) is Canada’s first and largest sea salt harvester, providing premium sea salts from British Columbia’s pristine waters.

Vancouver Island Salt Co. images

New to exporting, VISC hand-harvests their all-natural salt from the ocean around Vancouver Island. With the moon and the tides dictating when their hardworking harvesters can pull in the water, they spend many long hours tending to their salt and packing each box by hand. VISC also offers innovative flavour infused salt products such as their blue cheese sea salt, which can only be produced by hand-harvesting the salt. VISC adheres to all food safety and quality regulatory requirements.

Just as wine has “terroir”, sea salt has “merroir”, and VISC have set out to capture the essence of Vancouver Island, hoping it will become a household name for salt the way Bordeaux is for wine. Their no-chemicals added unrefined sea salt has a bold taste that has caused their chef customers to remark that less is needed to achieve their desired flavour profiles.

The company was first established in 2008 in Cobble Hill by a former chef who wondered why B.C. was known worldwide for its pristine coastline, but not the sea salt found in it. VISC’s production process has been certified as carbon neutral because of their use of biodiesel, and as they scale up production they are investigating alternative green energy sources such as hydro to maintain their commitment to the environment.