Official registries and open data list 866 active companies in administrative and support services in Alberta, which puts Alberta in 2nd place in Canada for this sector (20 % of the national total). 28 of them (3 %) have at least one known director, and 3 (<1 %) published an official change in the last 18 months: incorporation, amendment, change of director or address.
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Get 5 profiles from this segmentAdministrative and support services employ 822,361 people in Canada and group 168,297 establishments: one of the country's largest pools of businesses, and one of the most fragmented. Staffing, building services, security, call centres and waste management coexist here, with very different economic cycles.
NAICS 56 covers employment services, business support services (call centres, billing, collection), investigation and security services, services to buildings and dwellings (cleaning, landscaping), travel arrangement services, and waste management and remediation. ISED counts 168,297 establishments in 2025, of which 53,838 are employers.
The structure is atomized: 51.7% of employers have fewer than five employees and 45.3% have five to 99, but 235 establishments exceed 500 employees and hold a considerable share of the workforce. Average revenue for the sector's small and medium businesses was only $399.4 thousand in 2024, with 83.6% of firms profitable (ISED).
Payroll employment reaches 822,361 people in 2025, spread across services to buildings (217,575), employment services (191,049), investigation and security services (138,038) and waste management (61,161). Ontario holds 374,107 of them, Quebec 157,073, British Columbia 118,211 and Alberta 98,198.
Staffing went through a trough. Statistics Canada measures operating revenues of $24.3 billion for employment services in 2024, down 1.7%, the only annual contraction since 2013 outside the pandemic, with the operating margin narrowing to 4.3%. The cause is direct: the job vacancy rate fell from 5.6% in the second quarter of 2022 to 3.1% at the end of 2024.
The labour market has started to turn. In the first quarter of 2026, job vacancies rose by 11,800 (+2.4%) to 506,700, the first increase since the second quarter of 2022; the vacancy rate held steady at 2.8%. The gains come from sales and service and from the trades, which first benefits generalist temporary help agencies.
The other components follow their own logic. Waste management is growing: 27.5 million tonnes sent for disposal in 2024 (+1.5% over 2022), 59.7% of it non-residential, and employment up from 57,866 to 61,161 people in one year, driven by extended producer responsibility regimes. Sector GDP overall, however, fell 0.3% in 2024, while the economy grew 2%.
Regulation is provincial and highly segmented. Staffing agencies must hold a licence in Ontario (Employment Standards Act, 2000) and in Quebec (regulation respecting personnel placement and temporary foreign worker recruitment agencies). Security agencies and their guards are licensed province by province (Private Security and Investigative Services Act in Ontario, Bureau de la securite privee in Quebec, Security Services Act in British Columbia).
Waste management falls to environment ministries and municipalities, with extended producer responsibility regimes now in force in most provinces for packaging, electronics and organics. Call centres are governed by privacy rules (PIPEDA, Law 25 in Quebec) and by the National Do Not Call List administered by the CRTC.
The reference associations are ACSESS for staffing, the Canadian Security Association and its provincial counterparts, the Canadian Association of Environmental Service Companies for waste, and regional cleaning contractor associations. The major buyers are governments and public networks, property managers, hospitals, retailers and manufacturers.
Who buys what: staffing agencies buy applicant tracking software, payroll, insurance, compliance and job advertising; cleaning and security firms buy supplies, uniforms, scheduling software, training and vehicles; waste managers buy trucks, containers, sorting equipment and weighing and environmental compliance services.
Cycles and signals to watch: quarterly job vacancy data, the unemployment rate and layoffs (which announce temporary help demand three to six months later), public tenders for cleaning, guarding and waste collection, often multi-year, and municipal contract renewals that redistribute market share.
How ciblr helps: target the 53,838 employers by sub-sector and province, filter the 24,383 firms with five to 99 employees that make up the core addressable market, track public contract awards to identify incumbents and new entrants, and spot hiring waves as a signal that a contract has just been won.
6,923 employers and 98,198 payroll employees, for sector GDP of $8.0 billion (2024), more than British Columbia. Services to buildings (32,093 employees) and waste management (11,671) are growing clearly, driven by construction and industrial activity.
Of these 866 companies, 29 are federally incorporated, 6 are known through the provincial registry, 831 only through open data (licences, public contracts, grants, registered employers). 3 of them were founded in 2025 and 2026, that is <1 % of the active base; 3 incorporations in 2025. That is below the average of the three previous years (13 a year): the pace of creation is slowing.
Over the last 12 months, 18 companies in the sector (2 %) won at least one public contract, 60 contracts in all, published by governments, cities and public bodies. 21 received a federal grant or contribution (31 agreements).
Headcount is known for 687 companies (79 %): 12,745 declared jobs in total, and the median company has 10-19 employees.
2 companies (<1 %) publish a general phone or email, 386 have a website verified by ciblr, 590 hold an official licence or permit.
Moves published in the last 90 days: 1 public contracts, 1 dissolutions.
866 companies in administrative and support services are active in Alberta according to official registries and open data, that is 20 % of the 4,329 companies in the sector across Canada.
28 of these companies (3 %) have at least one director on the federal registry (the only registry that publishes directors), which lets you approach them through the right person.
ciblr sends 5 company profiles from this target free of charge, directors and contact details included. The subscription at 99 CAD per month gives access to the whole target, with Excel export and change tracking.
Every company counted here is active in an official registry (Corporations Canada, Registraire des entreprises du Québec, OrgBook BC) or named by an official open source (licence, public contract, grant, registered employer). The sector is a NAICS code, size comes from the declared headcount when a source provides it and otherwise from an estimate based on the registry (board size, age, status, statute), and "recent signal" means a published move (incorporation, amendment, change of director, address, contract, grant, hiring) in the last 18 months. Figures are recomputed every week from the ciblr database. No data is purchased or invented.
ciblr sends you 5 profiles of companies in administrative and support services in Alberta free of charge, directors and contact details included. For the whole target, the subscription is 99 CAD per month, no commitment.