You need a container mix for your containers. This should have no soil or very little soil. I make mine with 1/2 compost which contains a bit of soil (I make it myself), 1/2 moss peat from Canadian Tire and some perlite from Professional Gardener.

For your raised bed: Burnco sells bulk moss peat that I think is sedge/hypnum peat. It's much darker than the bagged stuff. It comes from a bog out by Water Valley. There are some commercial compost providers in the Calgary area that sell in bulk. You can have a fair amount of soil in the raised bed.

If the raised beds touch the ground (have an open bottom) I will have to respectfully disagree that you need soil less media.

I can't offer any advice for buying in the Calgary area but good luck in your search. There is a reason they call top soil "black gold"!!!

SCG

Best luck I have had is with Western Canada Garden Soil http://www.westerncanadagardensoil.ca/our-products.php . I usually buy the straight compost and am very happy with that. However, the economics of it only work for a couple of yards rather than the equivalent of a big yellow bag(1 cubic yard), I have used Eagle Lake for their cubic yard bags with mixed results. Some was great, some was material I should have returned but used anyways.

Ornamental Stone is nice if you want to get a few cubic feet since you can just fill up their bags yourself. That was my go-to place when I started out. They moved though so I never go there anymore.

Great info! Thanks everyone. Has anyone tried the mulch-compost blend that they offer at Western Canada Garden Soil please?

Ideally I would love to have the look of black mulch but also something that is nutritionally beneficial for my plants, so the wood chip mulch will not be that great then....

I used to use the Montane Mulch all the time, it lasts about a year before it totally breaks down. Looks great too.

shazam, thanks! I used Montane mulch for my front yard too, but thought that it was not dark enough.... and then weeds still grow through it! Yikes.... so I am wondering if I should use just black wood mulch this year. However, I worry that since the wood mulch will not decompose easily at all, then what do I do with all of that ugly mulch when the black colour wears off??? Would I have to remove that mulch manually in a couple of years time? Hmm....

The stuff at Ornamental that is labelled "Montane" was quite dark, not sure how it's like at other places (Ornamental says that they make all their own mulch). You should apply about 2 inches if you want any sort of weed suppression ability from any mulch. They also have a black mulch.

The big wood mulch breaks down eventually, but it takes a while, and yeah, the colour comes off after one season I find (sometimes even after one hard rainfall!).

The beds are elevated so I need something fairly light. I'm thinking I might try NutriLoam from BarkMulchDepot and mix in some coconut coir and/or peat.

As long as the bottom is open and touches the ground soil is fine and you don't need anything special. To mother nature it is just a man made hill. If totally enclosed you will want a soil less media to keep the perched water table down.

SCG