Canadian Blogs

Back-to-school shopping can be stressful no matter how many times you’ve done it. The school will often send out a list of mandatory supplies for elementary school students to help parents and their kids figure out what they need before the school year starts. But as kids get older there seems to be less guidance about what your child needs for the impending school year, even though they’ll often arrive on the first day of middle school or high school and have teacher’s asking why they didn’t pick up X item or get X brand of a specific scientific calculator.

We’ve decided to at least try and diffuse some of that back-to-school shopping anxiety by curating lists for both middle school and high school kids. These lists are obviously not exhaustive, nor are the items included on the list mandatory, but will probably serve best as a guide for what you should budget for.

Middle School back-to-school list:

backpack/sidebag and gym bag (especially if your child is involved in sports)

This should cover most of the basics that you’d need for your back-to-school supplies shopping. Most other items that you would need a teacher would specify ahead of time so that you could have time to go out and pick it up before classes begin.

As for back-to-school shopping, as kids get older they may like to exercise more agency in what they get for the new school year, especially if they’re in high school and have a part-time job that allows them to buy more, if not all, of their own clothes. This list is again more of a loose idea of what you can pick up to be prepared for the year ahead, but I’d suggest that before you go out shopping with your kids you do a purge of their closet where you lay all of their clothes out and sort them into three piles: things they still wear, things they’ve grown out of, and things they no longer wear anymore.

This will give you a clear idea of what their wardrobes are lacking in and what they’ve got too much of, which should also allow you to customize this suggested back-to-school shopping list to your child’s specific needs.

Customers of Loblaws PC Financial bank will be experiencing some major shifts come this October, as CIBC has officially taken over PC Financial and will be rebranding the bank as Simplii.

CIBC has been running the back-end of PC Financial’s in-house brand bank since its inception in 1997, but the two companies have decided to part ways, leaving CIBC in full control of the reins.

People who are currently members of PC Financial will continue to take advantage of the new bank, Simplii’s, no-fee daily banking and interest rates that were part of PC Financial.

Mortgages that were issued by CIBC will also remain the same, but customers will no longer be able to collect extra PC Plus points by using their Simplii card as of October 31, 2017. Points collected prior to this date, however, will remain on your account and can still be used towards collecting free groceries.

Loblaws has come out and said they plan to develop more products and to continue focusing on their popular loyalty program.

The PC Financial MasterCard products will also remained unchanged by CIBC’s absorption of PC Financial, meaning that you can still collect bonus PC points by using your MasterCard to pay for groceries.

Your “Netflix and Chill” habit is going to be increasing soon, and if you’re new to the streaming service, then the monthly fee increase of $1 (or $2 on the Premium plan) will be taking place immediately.

Netflix announced that Canadian users will be experiencing their first price bump in two years (the last one took place in October 2015) so that the service can “bolster its content and services”. There has been no mention that this price increase will affect other countries, more specifically the U.S.

It will now cost Canadians $8.99 for the basic plan (reg. $7.99/month), $10.99 for the standard plan (reg. $9.99) and the premium plan will see a $2 increase, as it will now cost $13.99/month rather than the $11.99/month that it was usually offered at.

In a statement, the streaming giant said that this price increase was a result of them introducing more product features and to “improve the overall Netflix experience.”

Netflix usually implements their price increases by country, as they respond to the local markets and the various demands for their service.

Netflix Canada is taking a big hit this week. Disney has just announced that, as of 2019, they will no longer be allowing Netflix to use their content.

In a statement released on August 8th, 2017, Disney came forward and stated that instead of selling their content to be streamed on the internet’s streaming giant, they would be acquiring majority ownership of BAMTech, which would then launch their own Disney-branded direct-to-consumer streaming service.

The shows will of course remain on the server until 2019, when Disney intends to launch their own service. There has been no mention of when or if this service will become available in Canada, but I can only assume that it will be some time after it has been initially launched in the U.S.

As a word of caution for you Marvel fans who may be hyperventilating in fear that hit Netflix originals like Jessica Jones and Luke Cage may be leaving the server, you can rest easy.

In an article originally published with NPR, they reported that Netflix intends to keep up their global partnership with Disney, particularly where it concerns producing its exclusive Marvel shows:

“Netflix, which lately has been focusing on its own exclusive programing, said it would continue to do business with Disney globally, including keeping its exclusive shows from Marvel television.”

All that glitters is not gold, particularly for MixBins glittered iPhone cases, which have had 11,444 units recalled by the Government of Canada. The cases affected by this worldwide recall are liquid glitter iPhone 6, 6s and 7 cases that have been sold between October 2015 and June 2017 as there have been reports of these cases causing skin irritations, blisters and in extreme cases, burns.

In a statement from MixBin Electronics, the company that distributes these glittered phone cases to other businesses, they said:

“The cases are being recalled due to the risk of skin irritation, blisters or burns if the liquid contained in the phone case leaks and comes into contact with the skin due to breakage or cracking of the case.”

In addition to the 11,000 units that were sold in Canada, there were 263,000 glitter cases that were sold in the U.S. and about 400 in Mexico. The cases were sold in several stores across North America, including:

Amazon.com

GetMixBin.com

Henri Bendel stores and online at henribendel.com

Nordstrom Rack stores

Tory Burch stores

Victoria’s Secret stores in the U.S., Canada, and Mexico, and online at victoriassecret.com

The UK rainboots that have probably been pinned more times than any other pair on Pinterest fashion boards are now coming to find a physical and non-virtual home in Canada.

Hunter, a British company that is best known for creating high-fashion and functional wellies, has decided to make Yorkdale Shopping Centre in Toronto their first official standalone store in Canada. The store will be opening up in October and will occupy a whopping 2,800 square feet.

With all that space, they will obviously be filling their shelves with more than just rainboots. Hunter’s Toronto store will feature indoor and outdoor apparel, as well as accessories for your rainboots that will make braving the wet and sometimes slushy Canadian fall and winter a bit more bearable and, more importantly, fashionable.

Cineplex Canada is certainly reshaping the ways we understand and experience entertainment in the 21st century. They first moved beyond the movie theatre brand that they initially gained fame for by adding entertainment venues like the Rec Room to their repertoire, and they are now looking to expand their idea of entertainment venues by partnering with Topgolf to bring this American brand to Canada.

Topgolf, as the name more than suggests, is a venue that gives customers the chance to play interactive and indoor games of golf with groups of friends. They have yet to suggest where the locations in Canada will be, but we can safely assume that the GTA will be one of the places across the country to test out the pilot of this program.

Topgolf games use microchipped balls so that you can play against single players, play in groups or simply by yourself to work on target practise. There are restaurants and bars that you can eat and drink at while you play, plus large plasma screen TVs that decorate almost every inch of exposed and available wall.

Topgolf and Cineplex have yet to say when or where these locations will be going, but we’ll be sure to keep you posted as soon as we get word!

In Canada, there are over 80,000 cases of skin cancer diagnosed each year and it is one of the most common types of cancer; if you were to combine all of the new cases of breast, lung, prostate and colon cancer, there would still be more new cases of skin cancer!

These statistics should hopefully encourage all of us to follow more safe sun practises more vigilantly, but there are times when you’re out longer in the day then you intended and the sun starts beating down and you can begin feeling your nose and forehead beginning to crisp. For those of us living in Toronto, you’ll be excited to hear about the launch of a pilot project that aims to help those of us caught out in the middle of a park or the waterfront with no extra UV protection.

Through the funds of the Douglas Melanoma Fund and the Douglas Wright Foundation, Toronto will be adding 6 free sunscreen dispensers to five different locations across the city. They include:

Kew Gardens Park,

Sherbourne Common,

Harbour Square Park,

HTO Park and

Little Norway Park

If you’re interested in learning more about the project, you can check out BeSunSafe.ca.

And for those of you not living near these free dispensers, or just generally looking to be more “Sun Safe”, here’s some tips from the Canadian Skin Cancer Foundation website:

keep out of the sun between 10am-4pm (or remain in the shade) or any time the UV Index is 3 or higher

You’ll remember our post the other day about how Tim Hortons was planning on raising the prices on select menu items. Well, it appears that they are not the only Canadian fast-food chain to be upping their menu prices as Pizza Pizza Canada has snuck some additional cents onto the price of adding select supreme toppings to your pizza.

With Tim Hortons increase, we at least received a notice ahead of time so that we wouldn’t be caught off guard when purchasing our morning double double. But with Pizza Pizza there was no such announcement, and the increase to the pizza toppings is done quite subtly so that you may not immediately notice the increase until checking out.

As you can see from the picture above, when you’re ordering a small, cheese pizza, when you add-on one of the ‘extra charge’ toppings, your pizza will shoot up from being $7.25 to $9.60. The total extra charge fee for these supreme toppings, versus the regular price toppings, will be $1.

This may not seem like a whole lot, but if you order pizza every week (as a fair number of us are guilty of doing…), the toppings could really add up.

Your regular morning double-double may be going up in price this August, though hopefully it won’t be actually doubling in price. Signs across Ottawa and Toronto indicate that Tim Hortons Canada will be giving some of their menu items a “slight increase” that will come into effect on August 2nd 2017.

The reasoning behind this slight price increase is “due to rising operational costs” and this increase will affect both hot beverages and some breakfast menu items, meaning that your morning B.E.L.T or breakfast sandwich could be one of the items taking the hit.

The last time that Tim Hortons increased their prices was in November 2014, where they increased the prices of hot beverages and sandwiches by approximately $0.10. The next increase is not specifying how much, nor is it detailing if the price increase will take place across the country or just in the cities with the posted signage.

If you’ve seen a sign like the ones mentioned above in your local Timmies, and you live outside of Ontario, please comment below to let others in your area know that the forthcoming price increase could be affecting their morning routine as well!

Like it or lump it, the discounted sister branch of Metro – Food Basics – is now open at the base of the new Fuse2 condo building in the Junction.

Initially met with great protest from many of the new condo residents, the announcement that Food Basics would be coming to the Junction Triangle neighbourhood instead of the more expensive option, Metro, is a divisive move that has been causing tension throughout the community.

A petition has begun circulating that has garnered over 300 signatures, in which the people are asking that the Food Basics be changed to a Metro, as they believe they were promised upon purchasing their condos.

You can see some residents praising the decision to keep with the original neighbourhood’s inhabitants, who would prefer a cheaper option for their grocery shopping, while others are not so keen for the less expensive option:

On a much happier and less controversial point, the new Food Basics is selling beer and wine!

For the month of August, expect a lot of great things to be happening over at Netflix Canada, as they have just released what their new lineup will be for the next month and there is a lot of good and not a whole lot of bad. There are over 60 movies and TV shows being added to the streaming service, including some Netflix originals like Surviving Escobar: Alias JJ and Wet Hot American Summer: Ten Years Later.

We’ve broken the shows and movies down by release date, but you can also check to see if the movie/tv show has an asterisk beside it. This will indicate that the movie/tv show has received an 80 percent or higher ranking on Rotten Tomatoes, which is the internet’s go-to resource for determining the quality measurement of TV shows and movies.

August 1-3:

Awake: A Dream from Standing Rock

Boychoir

Dawn of the Planet of the Apes***

Ex Machina***

It Follows***

Jackie***

Land Girls, Series 1-3

Maz Jobrani: Immigrant (Netflix Original)

Opening Night

Planet of the Apes (2001)

Ripper Street, Season 5

Rules Don’t Apply

Shadowhunters: The Mortal Instruments, Season 2, Part B (Netflix Original, New Episodes Weekly)

Coming on July 25th, McDonald’s Canada is bringing out some crispy and fresh new items to the menu. If you’re palette is one that appreciates spicier items, then you’ll be excited to learn that McDonald’s is bringing out a guacamole and jalapeño chicken sandwich. This sandwich features guacamole, tomatoes, jalapeños slices, fresh grilled chicken, cheese and fresh lettuce.

The other new offering is more of a classic chicken sandwich, which will include crispy chicken, red onion, sliced tomato, lettuce, mozzarella cheese and a delicious new sauce.

These sandwiches are going to be released on July 25th, and will be around for a limited time after they’re released.

Tim Hortons Canada has announced that they will be launching a new app that will allow customers to pre-order food and drinks with the tap of their thumb, only to be picked up later at the physical store.

This new app is going to launch sometime next week, with Wade McCallum, who owns six Tim Hortons in B.C. and Alberta, saying that the beta version will be available by July 27th.

The app is a similar set up to most fast food ones that are currently available, where it features pictures of the menu items so that the customers can easily select and modify what they’d like to order. Another useful addition to the app’s technology is that it will know when the customers are close to their preferred Tim Hortons.