Steam Whistle Brewing is one of Canada’s homegrown success stories. The company got its start back in 1998 when Greg Taylor, Greg Cromwell and Cam Heaps decided to start their own brewing company. They’d previously worked for an Ontario microbrewery, but after it was bought by a national retailer and slowly closed down, with staff, including Taylor, Cromwell, and Heaps being let go, they started looking for a new venture. While on camping trip up north, the seed was planted for what would become Steam Whistle Brewing. 

Sustainability and nostalgia

From the outset, the company was created to convey a sense of simpler times, sustainability and nostalgia. This not only reflected in the beer it brews and sells, including its signature, award-winning Steam Whistle Pilsner, but also its headquarters, the old CN Rail Locomotive Round House on Bremner Boulevard in downtown Toronto. Additionally, in keeping with its brand image, Steam Whistle also owns and operates a range of vintage vehicles which are owned and maintained by the company and frequently used as promotional tools during the summer months.

One of the most popular is a 1958 Chevrolet Apache pickup, appropriately named Retro Electro. Under the hood isn’t a Thriftmaster inline-six or 283 V-8, but rather a fully electric drivetrain, embracing one of Steam Whistle’s key attributes—sustainability.

Recently, Retro Electro was recommissioned and Autosphere had a chance to catch up with Greg Taylor, as well as Steve Payne, from Beachman Canada, which took on the job of re-commissioning the truck. 

Fully electric

The original concept for Retro Electro came about when one of Steam Whistle’s sales reps in Vancouver pitched the idea of creating an electric propelled classic vehicle, one that had enough power to perform burnouts. The result, Retro Electro, proved hugely popular, combining the iconic looks of the original Chevy Apache, with a zero-emission driveline and was used extensively for promoting Steam Whistle on the West Coast. 

“It really represented the retro look and feel of our brand,” explains Greg Taylor, “and when you combine that with the modern environmental ethos, which we also have, the result is just the ultimate icon.” 

When it was originally built, Retro Electro, was essentially created from scratch. “It was really ahead of its time,” says Steve Payne. “It had lithium-ion batteries before they were popular and used an A/C motor. It had some serious performance.”

Although it was used extensively on the West Coast for about 6-7 years, where climate and winter wasn’t really a concern, the rep who’d conceived it, used it and essentially served as caretaker for it, ended up moving on and the truck found itself being shipped back east to Steam Whistle headquarters in Toronto. 

Simpler, more efficient

There were, however, issues with the truck. As originally built with the electric drivetrain, it wasn’t very serviceable and not entirely practical to simply get in and drive. Another challenge was that with a fleet of vintage vehicles, not many of them are easy to operate, particularly for younger reps who don’t necessarily have the experience piloting these types of vehicles.

So, the seed was planted, to remake Retro Electro—keeping its iconic style but transforming it into a more efficient and easier to use promotional vehicle. 

When Beachman came along, the project kicked into high gear. Steve Payne explains that it took around a month to get the vehicle fully recommissioned for the road. From the outset, the idea was to preserve the vintage feel of the truck as much as possible, while ensuring it was easy to use and safe to operate.

The truck was given a new Lithium-Ion battery system, with the cells mounted in the rear, below the surface of the pickup bed. The larger battery pack has extended the truck’s operating range—doubling it in fact, and safety was enhanced with a Tesla regenerative braking system. Steve Payne says that when pulling everything apart and putting the truck back together, there was a lot of wiring that needed to be removed and redone and that he and fellow engineer/builder Kyle McDonald wanted to make sure that before it was released from Beachman’s care, everything worked, right down to the radio. 

Big buzz

The recommissioned Retro Electro was appropriately unveiled during Earth Day 2025 (April 22), and this summer will be out at multiple events, being utilized alongside Steam Whistle’s other vintage vehicles. 

“When you drive [Retro Electro] around the city, it just gets so much attention,” says Greg Taylor. “It’s so impactful, being bright green and it’s fully electric, meaning it can be used at all kinds of events, from baseball games to golf tournaments and it can be taken to places where normal vehicles can’t go, because it’s zero emissions.” Sounds like the best of all worlds to us.