As a small Canadian business owner, I never like to see a trade war begin.

For a small businesses like ours, trade is personal. Over the years, we have built well-established supply chains and developed relationships with small, often family-owned companies. These aren't simply names on purchase orders, in many cases I have gotten to know many of the owners personally and even become friends. 

So, no, I don't want a trade war.

I don't want to disrupt those relationships. I don't want to make it harder for good American family businesses to sell their products in Canada, any more than I want Canadian businesses to lose access to our customers south of the border.

But when Canada is attacked, we have to respond. And at Urban Nature Store, we've been working on this for some time.

Last year, when President Trump began threatening and demeaning Canada's national sovereignty, we started looking much harder for suppliers outside the United States — and, whenever possible, for Canadian suppliers.

That effort has continued.

If you've visited one of our Urban Nature Stores over the past year, you've probably noticed something different. You have seen new products, new brands and new suppliers appearing on our shelves.

Some are proudly Canadian-made.

We've added more Canadian-made suet products. We've found Canadian suppliers of seed cylinders, poles and hangers. We've expanded our selection of wooden birdhouses and bat houses. And, yes, we even found a Canadian-made squirrel house!

Many of these new products come from small Canadian businesses, including our Mennonite friends north of Kitchener. These are exactly the kinds of companies we love working with — small, hardworking, family-oriented businesses producing quality products right here in Canada.

We've also added new Canadian candle suppliers, gift suppliers and other products.

And we're not finished. Our search continues.

That search isn't always easy. The wild-birding business is a relatively small niche, and there simply aren't Canadian manufacturers for every product we sell. Some products have very limited sources anywhere in the world. Others are made almost exclusively in the United States.

So this isn't about pretending that we can suddenly eliminate every American-made product from our stores.

We can't. And, frankly, I'm not sure we should.

There are American companies we have dealt with for many years that are small, family-owned businesses. Their owners are friends. They have provided us with excellent products and excellent service for decades. I don't believe that their businesses should be treated as the enemy simply because our governments are having a disagreement.

But the search for alternatives will continue. Because there is another lesson in all of this: Canada needs to become more self-reliant.

We need more Canadian manufacturers. We need more Canadian suppliers. We need Canadian businesses producing the products that Canadians want to buy.

And we need Canadian consumers to recognize that every purchase is, in some small way, a vote for the kind of economy we want to build.

At Urban Nature Store, we're going to keep looking. We'll look across Canada first. We'll look around the world.

We'll find new products, develop new supplier partnerships and, hopefully, build some new friendships along the way.

And perhaps that's one small, positive thing that can come out of a very difficult situation. As a Canadian small-business owner, I never wanted a trade war. But when Canada is threatened, we can't simply sit back and hope somebody else responds.

We all have to do our part.

I'm proud to be Canadian. If you've ever driven past my house, my support for Canada hangs right in our front window.

And these days, my elbows are up. Not because I want to fight our neighbours. But because sometimes, when a bully pushes Canada, we need to stand up for ourselves.

My elbows are up, eh!

Paul