LCBO / The Beer Store

[spider]

Yet another oddity at the LCBO.
Last week I dropped in to my local LCBO to pick up some beers and as I walked down an aisle headed to the refrigerated beer storage room I noticed a winsome little bottle of wine from Australia crying out to me to take it home. I did. It turned out to be very good, so much so that I wanted to buy it again but in a larger bottle expecting to save a few pennies. Guess what? The 1500ML bottle was not a little less expensive than two 750ML bottles it was almost a dollar more!! There is the razor sharp retail acumen we have come to expect from these people, I asked the cashier if he was aware of this anomaly, he was not and made it very clear that he was not interested either.

 

[Skeezix]

I asked the cashier if he was aware of this anomaly, he was not and made it very clear that he was not interested either.

Of course he wasn't. He doesn't price the wine, nor does anyone to whom he reports (i.e. his manager, etc.). I would expect him to take an interest in matters which he can help solve (e.g. there is a broken bottle on the floor in the last aisle), but the absurdities of alcohol pricing in the province of Ontario is outside his bailiwick.

 

[Tewder]

Any customer concerns should be within his bailiwick, they certainly would be were this a private business and not a state-run monopoly.

My local LCBO completed a major expansion and renovation yet put in next to zero fridges for chilling wine. The massive walk-in fridges that were installed are all for beer... which makes no sense to me the consumer given I have no choice where I buy my wine. This is a blatant middle finger to the public it serves. Typical.

Screw the LCBO!

 

[Dan416]

Any customer concerns should be within his bailiwick, they certainly would be were this a private business and not a state-run monopoly.

My local LCBO completed a major expansion and renovation yet put in next to zero fridges for chilling wine. The massive walk-in fridges that were installed are all for beer... which makes no sense to me the consumer given I have no choice where I buy my wine. This is a blatant middle finger to the public it serves. Typical.

Screw the LCBO!

Even in a clothing store the staff wouldn't care if you brought up this kind of pricing artifact...

 

[Skeezix]

Agreed. I similarly don't berate the sales clerk at the Bay about the working conditions of garment workers in Bangladesh.

 

[junctionist]

LCBO question: when I was a kid and went to the liquor store with my dad, liquor stores had these small counters on one side of the store with a sink and some sort of liquid in it. If I recall correctly, the liquid wasn't clear and always swirled around. I always assumed they were for cooling bottles, but now they're gone and I can't find any information about them. Does anyone remember what this unusual feature was for?

 

[PinkLucy]

I remember that. I assume they were taken out when they started putting in the refrigerated coolers

 

[interchange42]

It was chilled water for rapidly cooling (typically) a white wine that you may want to take right to a dinner.

42

 

[Tuscani01]

Interesting. I would definitely use that if they brought it back! There's been far too many times where I've brought warm white's that came straight off the shelf to parties. Not fun!

 

[junctionist]

It was chilled water for rapidly cooling (typically) a white wine that you may want to take right to a dinner.

42

Thanks for the answer. It seems odd that they'd get rid of that feature. People still grab wines at the last minute.

 

[W. K. Lis]

Man challenges arrest for cross-border beer shopping
New Brunswick retiree is launching a constitutional challenges after he was arrested by the RCMP for buying cheaper beer in Quebec. A Prohibition-era law is in question.

From The Star, at this link:

Beer is on display inside a store in Drummondville, Que. A man whose drive from New Brunswick to Quebec to buy cheaper beer ended in arrest said Thursday he's looking forward to airing his constitutional challenge in court next month as a defence crowdfunding campaign gets underway.

A man whose drive from New Brunswick to Quebec to buy cheaper beer ended in arrest says he’s looking forward to airing his constitutional challenge in court next month as a defence crowdfunding campaign gets underway.

In an interview from Tracadie, N.B., Gerard Comeau said he just wants to know whether he has the right to buy his beer in Quebec.


“The Canadian Constitution says you’ve got the right to go buy any Canadian merchandise in any province and bring it from one province to the next,” Comeau said.


“So is it against the law? That’s what we’re trying to find out.”


As part of a sting operation, RCMP arrested Comeau, now 62, in October 2012 when he returned with 12 cases of beer and three bottles of liquor which he bought legally in Pointe-a-la-Croix, Que., just across the river from Campbellton. Police seized the booze and charged him with illegally importing alcohol into his home province.


Cross-border alcohol shopping is a regular thing in the area and the retired power lineman had been making the run two or three times a year into Quebec to buy beer — which costs about half the New Brunswick price — and lottery tickets.


However, provincial law in New Brunswick — related to federal anti-smuggling efforts implemented at the height of Prohibition — forbids importing more than one bottle of wine or 12 pints of beer — about 19 regular bottles — from any other province. The restrictions, stiffer than importing alcohol from the U.S., carry a $292.50 fine for violators.


Comeau’s case has drawn support from the Canadian Constitution Foundation, which this week launched a crowdfunding drive in an effort to raise $20,000 for a fight that seems destined to be decided by the Supreme Court of Canada.


“A lot of people don’t even know that provision is in the law,” Karen Selick, the foundation’s litigation director, said from Ottawa.


Constitutional experts will testify at the weeklong hearing in Campbellton slated to start Aug. 24.


Besides offering an entertaining history lesson, the foundation said it wants Canadians to help back Comeau in a case it says is crucial to interprovincial trade.


Section 121 of the Constitution is supposed to allow for the free flow of goods across provincial borders but, Selick said, a Supreme Court decision dating to 1921 that narrowly interpreted the section is at the heart of the dispute.


“We think that case was wrongly decided and that enough time has gone by that the Supreme Court should look at it again,” Selick said.


The foundation, a registered charity that bills itself as an independent, non-partisan organization that aims to defend Canadian constitutional freedoms, said the trade barriers benefit government monopoly sales agencies while constraining private business and citizens.


As a result, billions of dollars in provincial revenues are at stake and could affect industries as diverse as eggs, poultry and dairy products.


Comeau said he doesn’t know what became of the alcohol police seized. But win or lose, he’s not keen to get it back.


“It can’t be too good any more,” he said.

 

[W. K. Lis]

It's not just Ontario. From this link:

N.B. man fighting for right to import beer from Quebec

A senior official with New Brunswick's liquor corporation is defending a law that limits anyone in the province from having more than 12 pints of beer that weren't sold by a provincially licensed liquor outlet.

Richard Smith, senior vice-president with the NB Liquor Corp., testified Tuesday at a court hearing where Gerard Comeau of Tracadie is mounting a constitutional challenge of the system after he was charged with illegally importing alcohol into New Brunswick from neighbouring Quebec.

Without legislation to prevent the direct sale of liquor to consumers by producers, Smith said it could put the provincial Crown corporation out of business.

"If the province doesn't have the authority it does today to retail product, I don't think it would take long for producers to set up their own retail network," he said.

Smith said NB Liquor has annual profits of about $165 million.

Comeau launched his constitutional challenge over whether he can buy cheaper beer in Quebec and bring it home.

"I'm a Canadian citizen, I should be able to buy my merchandise where ever I like," he said outside the court.

Comeau was charged in an RCMP sting operation in October 2012 after he bought a dozen bottles of beer and three bottles of liquor in nearby Pointe-a-la-Croix, Que.

Constitutional lawyer Arnold Schwisberg says he will argue that Section 134 of the New Brunswick Liquor Control Act is unconstitutional.

That section says you can't purchase or have liquor not purchased from NB Liquor, while Section 43 provides an exception for up to 12 pints of beer.

Schwisberg says Section 121 of the Constitution Act allows for the free entry of goods, produce and manufacture between provinces.

Karen Selick of the Canadian Constitution Foundation says regardless of how the New Brunswick court rules, there will likely be an appeal that could end up before the Supreme Court of Canada.

There is an organization fighting this called Free My Grapes. Go to this link.

 

[devjohnson]

Any updates on the LCBO at Yonge/Wellesley? Been closed for most of the year.

 

[W. K. Lis]

Small-scale still sues LCBO for ‘unconstitutional’ markup

Toronto Distillery Co. says the LCBO imposes a nearly 50% markup on every bottle, with no provisions for small distilleries.

From The Star, at this link:

A Toronto craft distillery known for its unaged whiskey and organic beet spirits is suing the LCBO, claiming the public alcohol monopoly’s markup on each bottle of booze sold is “unconstitutional.”

While the tax on beer and wine is set out in the Alcohol and Gaming Act, Charles Benoit, a co-founder of the Toronto Distillery Company, says the LCBO unilaterally imposes a tax of 45.9 per cent on every bottle he sells at his distillery without any basis in law.

“Taxes must be voted upon by legislators,” said Benoit, who previously worked as a lawyer in Washington D.C. “It’s one of the core precepts of responsible government: they didn’t want the unelected governing council just imposing taxes on a whim.”

“We totally accept that they’re going to get revenue from distilling. That’s inevitable. But it should be done via legislation. The members of the legislature, we are able to talk to them. But we have no idea who came up with this LCBO spirits policy.”

Citing the ongoing litigation, the LCBO and the Ontario government declined to comment for this story.

The Toronto Distillery Company, which has been distilling small batch organic spirits in the Junction since 2013, had a popular unaged whiskey that sold well that the LCBO in December of that year. Since then, the company has struggled to get another product onto liquor store shelves and has turned to selling bottles directly to the public at its distillery near St. Clair Ave W. and Keele St.

In the lawsuit filed in Superior Court last week, Benoit writes that he has to pay the LCBO $12.44 for every bottle of gin he sells at $26.85. This levy is the same amount he would have to pay if the bottle was sold at an LCBO store — despite the fact that the public corporation doesn’t have to incur any warehousing or retailing costs.

“If we want to have small scale distilling, we can’t have a system where on your very first bottle sold, half the retail price is owed to the LCBO not including the other taxes,” he said.

Wine and beer producers are taxed differently depending on their size. In Ontario, microbreweries are charged less per bottle than large beer producers, and even less if they sell their beer on site.

In B.C. no taxes are imposed on a distillery’s first 50,000 L, and Nova Scotia and Saskatchewan have similar sliding scales for small liquor producers. But without similar provisions in Ontario, Benoit says craft distillers will be forced to purchase alcohol in bulk on the international market in order to make ends meet.

“We actually distil what we sell. We’re not just running private liquor stores,” he said. “I see no viable future for small batch grain-to-glass distilling in a system that demands a king’s ransom percentage from every bottle a distillery distils, bottles, markets and retails itself.”

 

[ryguy7787]

http://www.blogto.com/eat_drink/2015/08/lcbo_to_introduce_growlers_and_craft_beer_tasting_bar/

I am very happy with this decision and I hope this catches like wildfire within the larger lcbo's province-wide. I'm loving the fact that it's strictly brands they don't currently sell as well.
This should be a great advantage for craft brews to get their name out there without having to bottle/can everything. A tasting room is an added bonus, much better than a small sample booth with only one or two products.
I can only hope that things will just become more aggressively pro-indy brewer/cider/distilery. I feel that social and print media are the main reasons for these (shouldn't have to be, but are) big changes. Bring on the super markets!!!