Taproot becomes Canada’s largest employee-owned trust with 750 workers

Each Taproot worker receives an equal ownership stake at no cost, with dividend payments distributed according to hours worked during the fiscal year. Pictured are Taproot team members.

A British Columbia-based support services provider has become the largest company in Canada to transfer ownership to its employees through a new model designed to help owners sell their businesses without seeking outside buyers.

Taproot Community Support Services, based in Maple Ridge, B.C., announced to its workers Tuesday that it has been sold to its 750 employees through an employee ownership trust, or EOT, a structure only introduced in Canada last year.

The move makes Taproot the country’s largest EOT to date, according to Employee Ownership Canada, and highlights how the model could play a role i