How InterFulfillment helps Team Canada athletes celebrate a major moment on their Olympic journeys
The leadup to an Olympic Games can be a whirlwind.
For athletes, the pressure can be immense as they strive to achieve results that will earn them a spot on Team Canada.
Concurrently, behind the scenes, there is intense planning and coordination taking place to ensure that when athletes are named to those Olympic spots, they get everything that comes with their team announcement moment.
It’s a deeply significant and celebratory milestone that wouldn’t be possible without invested involvement from the Official Order Fulfillment Logistics Partner of Team Canada, InterFulfillment.
“Olympic fulfillment leaves virtually no room for error, making it one of the most time-sensitive and logistically complex operations that InterFulfillment manages,” said InterFulfillment General Manager Derek Antram.
“InterFulfillment’s reliability is so fundamental to the experience [of a team announcement],” explained Hayley Wyatt, a Coordinator with the Games team at the Canadian Olympic Committee (COC). “Having the apparel there, in the right place and at the right time, transforms it into a meaningful experience for the athlete—one they can physically see, feel, and remember as the moment they became part of Team Canada.”
InterFulfillment officially came on board as a COC partner in 2022, though the company’s relationship with Team Canada began three years earlier. In that time, InterFulfillment has become very familiar with the unique challenges that come with each Olympic Games.
“The biggest challenge is managing dynamic, unmovable deadlines driven by the sheer unpredictability of athlete qualification schedules,” said Adayra Lopez, InterFulfillment’s Vice President of Sales. “Unlike standard commercial clients with predictable promotional calendars, Olympic timelines hinge on roster lock-offs that happen at the very last second.”
This is not only because of how the Olympic qualification process naturally plays out, but also the impact of unforeseen circumstances, such as injuries.
Each sport has its own qualification period and way of selecting which athletes will form the Olympic team. Based on their past performances, some athletes are more certain than others of their potential to be named, especially when qualification is based on a cumulative ranking.
But there are some sports in which a designated competition plays a decisive part and almost anything could happen.
“The moment final trial results are verified, our account and project leads step in immediately to translate that raw data into an actionable fulfillment plan,” added Lopez.
To make things as smooth as possible, a schedule for order processing is organized according to the dates and locations of each team announcement. This takes into account how long it takes for a shipment to get to different places across Canada and the world.
Ahead of the Milano Cortina 2026 Olympic Winter Games, curling team announcement kits needed to make their way to Halifax. Figure skating kits had to get to Gatineau, Quebec. Kits for short track speed skating were needed in Montreal. Long track speed skating kits had to be split between Quebec City and Calgary. Bobsleigh and skeleton kits were also needed in Calgary, while the kits for snowboard slopestyle and big air athletes needed to travel to Whistler, B.C.
Those were for in-person team announcement events, however, athletes in other sports such as alpine skiing and ski jumping needed their kits shipped to Europe where they were competing on their international circuits before travelling to the Games.
As athlete names were confirmed, Wyatt provided all the necessary information—including clothing size, delivery date and address, and a list of all items to be picked and packed for each Olympic team member—to InterFulfillment.
“The team announcement program has grown exponentially in scale and scope, and what I once could manage independently would simply not be possible today,” said Wyatt. “[InterFulfillment’s] partnership allows me to focus on the broader objectives of the team announcement while knowing that the operational details are in capable hands.”
Because of the non-negotiable deadlines, everything related to a team announcement happens at a very quick pace. For example, the figure skating team announcement was on the same day that the national championships finished. That was one of 12 team announcements that took place in January, with eight of them occurring in the span of a week.
To help facilitate the rush, InterFulfillment increases staffing levels during peak periods and has contingency plans in place for unforeseen challenges such as transportation disruptions. The fulfillment process also includes multiple quality assurance checks.
“Our warehouse management software provides a two-step verification process that reduces almost all chances of picking and packing errors. In this process, every item in each kit is scanned and verified once at the picking stage, then again when a second team member packs the kit. The second team member also acts as a second set of eyes for another level of verification,” explained Scott Kelly, Inventory Control and Project Coordinator at InterFulfillment.
In the end, there were 377 team announcement kits that were successfully picked, packed, and shipped by InterFulfillment for the 207 nominated athletes as well as 170 coaches and support staff. But there were even differences in those kits, with athletes receiving 17 items and staff members receiving 12 items, so attention to detail was critical.
“When Team Canada announcements roll out in quick succession across the country, our job is to ensure every kit arrives exactly where it needs to be, exactly when it’s needed. We manage this through disciplined planning, real‑time coordination, and a fulfillment operation built for speed and accuracy,” said Antram.
For the InterFulfillment employees who work so hard behind the scenes, supporting Team Canada is “a source of pride,” says Kelly. “Knowing that our contributions are getting the athletes’ team wear to them so they can display the nation’s colours on the world’s stage.”
Added Antram: “This partnership is more than a logistics achievement. It’s a point of national pride for our entire organization.”
“It is a close and highly collaborative relationship. I work with the same team of people consistently, which means I know them by name and can pick up the phone and reach out directly when needed,” said Wyatt. “It feels less like working with an external vendor and more like having a trusted team and partnership working alongside me to get the project across the finish line.”
