Metro premieres a fresh food experience during an exclusive preview of the new Metro.ca

Grocery retailer offers inspired recipes for the TIFF Festival® season

TORONTO, Sept. 9, 2013 /CNW/ - Metro Ontario is committed to enhancing its customers' grocery experience by providing inspiring food solutions through a newly launched digital ecosystem that simplifies the lives of its customers.  The Metro.ca website and MyMetro mobile app officially launch first thing Monday morning.

"The Metro brand is all about fuelling people's appetite for life," explains Marc Giroux, Vice President, Chief Marketing & Communications Officer, Metro Inc. "We want to help simplify our customers' grocery experience and create opportunities for personalized discovery in store and through our new digital ecosystem."

To celebrate the launch of its new metro.ca website and app, Metro recently hosted a party at Toronto's Thompson Hotel during the opening weekend of the TIFF Festival.  Food is an integral part of entertaining and one of the items remembered most after a party or get together. Using a select range of private label Irresistibles branded products, Metro partnered with Executive Chef, Robert Mills, to create TIFF-inspired recipes that included Grilled Shrimp with Caponata and Celeriac Puree; Goat Cheese Semifreddo, Poached Niagara Yellow Plums; and Flank Steak with Chimmichurri Sauce. Party guests and Metro shoppers can find all of the custom designed recipes at Metro.ca alongside 4,500 other recipes now featured on the new site.

"Metro has tapped into a trend we're seeing in the restaurant industry, people are becoming more adventurous with food and are often eager to try something new," says Mills. "Inspiring people to be more creative in the kitchen will have a huge ripple effect on their relationship with food and I think it's fantastic."

Metro is an official screening sponsor of TIFF Festival 2013 for the world premiere of The Grand Seduction, a Canadian production starring Gordon Pinsent, Brendon Gleeson and Taylor Kitsch and directed by Don McKellar. The film is a remake of the Quebec film, La grand seduction.

"Metro is thrilled to be launching the new metro.ca site and mobile app at this year's Toronto International Film Festival," says Giroux. "Supporting the local communities in which we operate is important to us and there is no event or festival that brings communities in Ontario together more enthusiastically than TIFF Festival."

For meal inspiration and personalized grocery experience, visit www.metro.ca or download the free app through the App Store¹ online store.

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1}   App Store is a trademark of Apple Inc.

About Metro Ontario Inc.
Metro is a Canadian company with annual sales of over $11 billion and over 65,000 employees. It is a leader in the food and pharmaceutical sectors in Quebec and Ontario, where it operates a network of more than 600 food stores under several banners including Metro, Metro Plus, Super C and Food Basics, as well as over 250 drugstores mainly under the Brunet, The Pharmacy and Drug Basics banners.

SOURCE: Metro Ontario Inc.

Anne Morello
GCI Group
416-486-5904
[email protected]