1200 Degrees Ontario celebrated the grand opening of its new Burford facility with a ribbon-cutting ceremony on Thursday, May 7, 2026.
A Canadian company, 1200 Degrees Ontario specializes in fire apparatus sales, preventative maintenance, emergency repairs, refurbishments, and technical support, along with a full range of frontline emergency response equipment.
“We’re the E-ONE dealer for Ontario, and E-ONE makes ladder trucks, pumper trucks and tankers for local municipalities and industrial businesses,” said Jeffrey Climie, Co-owner and General Manager of 1200 Degrees Ontario. “Beyond that, we also sell equipment, so, for example we handle brands like Holmatro, Dräger and FLIR, which help support firefighters; things like bunker gear, SCBA (self-contained breathing apparatus) and thermal imaging cameras. That’s what we specialize in.”
“Of course, we also have our parts and service side, where, if a truck needs to be fixed, it would be brought here. With our new shop, we’re able to fit up to 12 trucks inside because we’ve got five full bays,” he continued. “We’ve got a whole mobile service that we do as well. That’s great because it allows us to go right to our customers and try to fix as much as we can in-hall, because a lot of people don’t want to take their fire truck out of the hall or out of the municipality to get it fixed in Brant County.”
The company is part of the 1200 Degrees Group, which has three dealerships, two of which are in Quebec and the third being in Ontario. Climie said that the Ontario dealership had previously been operating out of Ayr before re-locating to Burford this past December, ultimately making the move after outgrowing the former facility.
“We’ve really grown our business over the past three or four years, which has been fantastic, but that comes with new challenges as you continue to need more inventory and employees, and need more space for those employees,” he said. “We did look around the Kitchener and Woodstock areas, but ultimately chose beautiful Brant County; the municipality definitely wanted to work with us and made it an easy transition here, so between that and Paulson Construction, who we partnered with to build the new building, it was a smooth move.”
The company’s new location represents a $6 million investment into the County of Brant, and the 18,000-square-foot facility has been purpose-built to support fire stations across the province.
“We’ve gone from what was an unorganized 12,000-square-foot building to a facility built by us, for us, here in Burford. We may have only gained around 6,000 square feet, but it certainly allows us maximum efficiency,” said Climie. “Being in the fire industry, we needed a shop that didn’t have any overhead beams in it so we could swing aerials around, and had additional space in the parts department because we do a lot of skid work. This space has certainly opened up our possibilities, especially because it’s just off the highway and gives us access across Ontario.”
In speaking about the grand opening event, Climie said he was thankful for everyone who came out to show their support.
“I couldn’t believe the amount of people that we had come through,” he said. “We had over 200 people, 50 different fire services, the Brant County mayor and council, the MPP, and our neighbours also came over too, which was fantastic. We just felt supported by both the community and the customers, and it was a really nice day for us; it exceeded our expectations.”
Climie ended by thanking the County and the community for all its support.
“I have to say thank you to everyone, it’s been absolutely fantastic working with the County, right from the permitting process to the building, being accepted by the community, and ultimately having our grand opening,” he said. “It’s been absolutely phenomenal being welcomed into such a nice place and a beautiful county, so thank you to the community.”
1200 Degrees Ontario has already hired two new employees since being at the new location, and now boasts a staff of 22. Climie said that once they get through the summer and fully settle into their new space, they’ll look to hire another two in the fall.
Kimberly De Jong’s reporting is funded by the Canadian government through its Local Journalism Initiative.The funding allows her to report rural and agricultural stories from Blandford-Blenheim and Brant County. Reach her at kimberly.dejong@brantbeacon.ca.
