Is that grocery product really Canadian? Or is it 'maple-washing'?

Amid the patriotic chest-thumping and sincere efforts of Canadians to do right by their country in the face of the on-again, off-again U.S. tariffs, the humble little Maple Leaf has been working overtime.

Perhaps nowhere more so than at the grocery store, where shelves are emblazoned with red maple leaves to indicate that certain products are, to some extent, Canadian.

But does it mean what shoppers think it means? Why do some Canadian products have a maple leaf sticker or shelf talker, while others do not?

A visit to a Halifax Sobeys and Superstore found a somewhat haphazard and bewildering use of the indicators.

For example, Kicking Horse Coffee had a maple leaf sticker on the shelf at one Sobeys, while Newfoundland-based Jumping Bean Coffee did not. Kicking Horse Coffee was originally based in British Columbia, but was sold to Italy's Lavazza in 2017.

Coffee beans from Tim Hortons, which is owned by a Brazilian investment firm, did not have the sticker at Sobeys, but did have a shelf talker at the Superstore saying it was "prepared in Canada." The packages themselves had a prominent maple leaf on the front, with text underneath that said "roasting in Canada since 1964."

Some products that are likely known by locals to be produced in Nova Scotia, such as Farmers milk, Oxford blueberries and Cosman and Whidden honey did not have the sticker at one Sobeys, though some did have the branding for Nova Scotia Loyal. Nova Scotia Loyal is a provincial program that labels products as being locally made.

Nova Scotia-based Just Us Coffee had coffee beans with both the Nova Scotia Loyal branding and the maple leaf sticker on the shelf. 

The maple syrup aisle was equally confusing. Only one maple syrup product at Sobeys — the store's in-house brand, Our Compliments — received the maple leaf shelf treatment, while several other Canadian brands did not.

Anna and Chris Hutchinson have been producing maple syrup at their farm south of Berwick, N.S., for more than a decade, selling locally as well as exporting to the Middle East, the Netherlands and Costa Rica.

Anna Hutchinson drives her products to every Sobeys store in the province and stocks the shelves herself.

She has noticed that some stores have the maple leaf sticker on the shelves bearing her syrup, while others do not. She says using the stickers is at the discretion of the store manager, but if some are missing next to her product, it's likely just human error.

"I think it's just staffing," she said. "They just don't have enough staff to look after things."

And, granted, grocery stores carry thousands of products. It would be difficult to successfully label everything correctly.