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![\"Ruth](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/3992144_web1_260218-NIBI-Enviro-Tech2-.jpg\")
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Ruth Bonneville \/ Free Press<\/p>\n
NIBI Enviro Tech co-founder Robin Richards at the company\u2019s Transcona facility.<\/p>\n
Richards started the company in 2022 with business partner Kelsey Friesen. Last year, the company set up its headquarters in an industrial park in the Transcona neighbourhood of Winnipeg and began manufacturing pods.<\/p>\n
Richards and Friesen started kicking around the idea for the business during the COVID-19 pandemic. Food insecurity was on the rise at the time, and the longtime friends wondered if they could offer sustainable, practical solutions to underserved communities across Canada.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve always just been spitballing ideas on how to make the world a better place and this is where we landed,\u201d Richards said.<\/p>\n
Richards, who is M\u00e9tis, used the Ojibwa word for water to name the company.<\/p>\n
Among NIBI\u2019s offerings is a water purification pod aimed at customers in remote and Indigenous communities. The pod includes a pump house where residents can bring bottles to sanitize and fill.<\/p>\n
The system can produce up to 28,000 litres of potable water per day per pod, according to NIBI\u2019s website, and can draw feed water from a range of sources, such as bores, streams and saltwater.<\/p>\n
The company also offers the NIBI Agro Pod, an adaptable agriculture system that allows the owner to grow fresh food.<\/p>\n
While walking through NIBI\u2019s shop at 770 Pandora Ave. E last week, Richards pointed out one container the company had turned into a commercial kitchen for a community in the Northwest Territories, and another bound for Quebec that had been turned into a smoke shop, complete with front counter, shelves and digital signage.<\/p>\n
The company recently sent seven agro pods to Mississippi and 22 to Maryland in the United States.<\/p>\n
\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t Ruth Bonneville \/ Free Press<\/p>\n Some of NIBI Enviro Tech\u2019s containers are being made into commercial kitchens to be shipped to northern communities for teaching facilities.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re able to deploy these anywhere in the world,\u201d Richards said. \u201cThere\u2019s nothing better to ship than a shipping container, so it really works out in our favour.\u201d<\/p>\n Richards and Friesen bring a variety of experiences to their work at NIBI. Richards was a professional hockey player before transitioning to a career in sales.<\/p>\n Friesen, meanwhile, co-founded Winnipeg nutraceutical company Innotech Nutrition. He then moved on to local cannabis producer Delta 9 Bio-Tech Inc., where he helped develop the company\u2019s business-to-business division.<\/p>\n NIBI employs five people and uses subcontractors to fabricate the pods. Richards declined to say how much the pods retail for, but said NIBI\u2019s prices are competitive with companies like Growcer, the Ottawa-based modular farming startup that has a manufacturing operation in Manitoba.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re able to put ourselves in the price point that we need to be to be competitive as well as (to) be accommodating to these (Indigenous and remote) communities,\u201d Richards said.<\/p>\n Making a difference in the community is important to Richards and Friesen. To that end, NIBI has partnered with Food Banks Canada to transport $25,000 worth of food to Sambaa K\u2019e First Nation in the N.W.T.<\/p>\n The food will be transported to the First Nation in three modular pods the community ordered.<\/p>\n NIBI\u2019s interest in helping Indigenous and remote communities make them a good partner for Food Banks Canada, said Jason Stevens, a manager at the charity.<\/p>\n \u201cWe just felt we wanted to be part of this project where food is being shipped into a First Nation in the North, and we wanted to bring attention to food insecurity issues that our communities face in the north,\u201d Stevens said.<\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t Ruth Bonneville \/ Free Press<\/p>\n NIBI Enviro Tech workers working on one of their units. The Winnipeg company designs and builds customized, modular mobile facilities out of shipping containers. <\/p>\n To help get NIBI off the ground, Richards received a non-repayable grant from the Louis Riel Capital Corp., an institution of the Manitoba M\u00e9tis Federation that helps Red River M\u00e9tis citizens start, expand or acquire businesses.<\/p>\n \n\t\tWinnipeg Free Press | Newsletter\n\t<\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\t NIBI is one of 926 M\u00e9tis-owned businesses registered with the Red River M\u00e9tis Business Directory, said MMF senior economic adviser Lorne Pelletier.<\/p>\n In 2024-25, the LRCC funded nearly $6 million in commercial loans which supported 57 businesses, Pelletier said. The corporation also approved more than $3 million in grant funds to 63 Red River M\u00e9tis-owned businesses.<\/p>\n \u201cRed River M\u00e9tis are entrepreneurial people \u2026 and Robin at NIBI is introducing a really innovative product to the market,\u201d Pelletier said.<\/p>\n The LRCC wants M\u00e9tis entrepreneurs to succeed so they can support themselves but also the larger community through job creation and by providing quality products and services, Pelletier added.<\/p>\n aaron.epp@freepress.mb.ca<\/p>\n \t\t\t\t Aaron Epp Aaron Epp reports on business for the Free Press. After freelancing for the paper for a decade, he joined the staff full-time in 2024. Read more about Aaron<\/a>.<\/p>\n Every piece of reporting Aaron produces is reviewed by an editing team before it is posted online or published in print \u2014 part of the Free Press\u2018s tradition, since 1872, of producing reliable independent journalism. Read more about Free Press\u2019s history and mandate<\/a>, and learn how our newsroom operates<\/a>.<\/p>\n
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