How some small business owners in Toronto are preparing for a possible Canada Post strike

Some small business owners in Toronto, worried about the impact of a possible strike by Canada Post workers on online sales, are already making changes to their operations.

At Wheels and Wings Hobbies, on Danforth Avenue, owner Don McCowan says he is nervous about the prospect of a strike, given he is already contending with U.S. tariffs and concerns of a recession.

He says he is trying to hold his business together.

"It's very, very hard. We're spending too much time trying to keep our business going since COVID... We're always getting blocks," McCowan said.

His shop, which turns 40 next year, does nearly half of its business online and uses Canada Post to deliver 99 per cent of the items it ships out.

"We've notified our customers through our e-commerce site and through Facebook. And so, we're already seeing a downturn because they're afraid of getting their parcels locked into a warehouse for whatever length of time this could take," McCowan said. 

"We're going to probably have to move to couriers immediately before even finding out if there's going to be a strike."

Concerns about both strike and after-effects

On Wednesday, Canada Post said it filed a new set of proposals for workers in the urban bargaining unit and the rural and suburban unit.

The Canadian Union of Postal Workers (CUPW), which represents about 55,000 employees of the postal service, said its negotiating team would examine the proposals on Wednesday afternoon.

The new offers came days after the union issued a strike notice that could see postal workers back on the picket line on Friday. Canada Post also said it has rejected the union's request for two weeks to consider the proposals.

On the other side of Toronto, along Queen Street W., Elana White, owner of the card and gift store, Outer Layer, says a strike would affect sales. About 25 per cent of her business is online.

She says she's begun "troubleshooting" to prepare for a strike.

"We did suspend our letter mail service because we send small things like greeting cards and stickers. You can just put that in an envelope with a stamp on it, and that's only via Canada Post," White said.

"We're able to offer cheap and free shipping on stuff like that. But we had to suspend that because of the threat of a strike."

White says if there is a strike, there will likely be after-effects with letter mail being slow for at least two months, as was the case with the last Canada Post strike.

'A strike can be highly disruptive,' business advocate says

Jasmin Guénette, vice-president of national affairs for the Canadian Federation of Independent Business, says the looming job action is causing uncertainty. The non-profit organization says it has more than 100,000 members

"Obviously, a strike can be highly disruptive," Guénette said on Wednesday.

Guénette says CFIB members are saying, "Oh no, not again." The last strike, which lasted 32 days in November and December 2024, had a massive impact on many small businesses across the country in part because it was during the holiday season, he said.

He says small businesses use Canada Post to send and receive packages, send marketing materials to potential clients, send and receive invoices and payments.

The CFIB estimates that close to 80 per cent of small businesses in Canada use Canada Post for their operations and the last strike is estimated to have impacted about 75 per cent of them.

Guénette says the possibility of the strike is a "good test" for newly elected Prime Minister Mark Carney. 

He says the CFIB hopes that the new federal government will force the parties to stay at the table to negotiate until they can reach an agreement, ask them to maintain full services while they negotiate and provide Canada Post with the latitude it needs to change its business model to make it financially viable again.