Now, what does this remind you of?
"We didn't realize the LCBO considered this a licensee sale," Korberg explained in an interview with CTVNews.ca. That means the LCBO charges the vineyard as if it has sold the bottle to the LCBO for distribution, then charges them to buy it back. "This is a bottle of wine that has never left the property. The wine in the bottle is made 100 per cent by the grapes grown by our own property, by us, and I have to give half the cost of that bottle to the LCBO in order to sell that wine by the glass on my own property," he said.
Canadians are merely serfs and aren't technically and legally citizens, they are in fact subjects of a foreign Monarch. This same Monarch who indirectly administers the LCBO, also has veto power on who the political executives in Canada. Positions like Premiers, Judges, Senators, Police Chiefs, Property Appraisers etc., never ever appointed( notice the word appointed) without her express say-so.
This same benevolent dictator has decided that you must only watch the television and media that her CRTC approve of, buy all your liquor at her stores, fly on her airlines, ship goods on her Railways, patronize her museums, and of course never-ever carry a gun in her private domain named Canada.
And another thing...
The property in question in this story does in fact belong to the Crown and therefore is her property, as is all of the equipment and leasehold improvements on that land. All property, water,equipment, fish, trees, cars, ipods, clouds, mosquitos, technically belong to the Crown. Yes Canadians have transferable (yet revocable) Priveledges to Real Estate and other property purchased with the Queen's currency, they do not however have TITLE to this property.
Of course the real question is if you have to wear a mask and avoid eye contact when buying a box of beer in their stores.
I refuse to purchase the plonk that passes for wine in Canada.
A coupla years back the vintners of Ontario petitioned their government to decrease the requirement of having to use local grape juice from 20% to 10. The government of the day refused.
If Ontario wine can use 80% foreign grape juice and still think they are legitimate wine produces why not just purchase the real thing? From California?
Hey Onteriowe. You voted for it.Suck it up,buttercups.
I love the breakdown of LCBO charges:
1. LCBO markup
2. LCBO wine levy
3. LCBO volume levy
4. LCBO environmental levy
Add to the last one a "container deposit" (what is the difference between a container deposit and an environmental levy anyway?), plus the fact that the LCBO is 100% provincially owned and the government charges PST baked into the HST and you have a pretty well thought out monopoly.
But I do commend the LCBO on wine selection and overall customer service, especially if you email or phone in your order.
Wine....rotten grapes and sour crap thrown into a a bucket. But I guess the frogs love it,as they have no taste,
One of the positive things that came out of the privatization of liquor sales here in Alberta is both selection and accessibility. Liquor stores everywhere and the best variety in Canada. One store in Edmonton advertises over100 varieties of beer. I've been there. It's mind boggling.
Another store in a small town must have 50 different kinds of rum.
The point of all this is simple. While the LCBO is the single largest buyer of alcohol in the world they offer their customers very limited choice. I'd venture that Alberta has 3x the choice Ontario has and maybe more. The small stores are often niche players.
I was in a store in Ontario this summer and they had 16' of shelf space with one product on it - Lambs Palm Breeze. You won't see that in Alberta
Good luck succeeding in suing the LCBO. As long as it's the government cash cow that it is does anyone really think Wynne would allow anything to change?
To me it sounds like extortion or racketeering.
I'm not so sure about that.
When the largest grog shop in my neighbourhood was ALCB, it had an excellent selection of European wines, particularly French and German.
It used to have a large section for that but now there are only one or two rows in the middle of the store with a paltry selection at best. I recall that it even had some older vintages in its inventory once in a while, but now one's lucky if one finds anything more than 5 years old.
One of the problems is that I don't think there's anyone on staff who knows much about wine. They probably figure that a decent European vintage tastes the same as Canadian plonk, probably likening it to little better than Baby Duck.
Certainly not all liquor stores in Alberta have large and varied selection, but because there is so much competition it has led to stores specializing in certain products. Some have a big Scotch selection or French wine. You have to seek them out.
There is no dispute over who has the broadest product list. The LCBO pales by comparison.
Forget the wine, Wynne has put Ontario out of business for years to come, the province is beyond the beyond with no chance pf recovery for decades to come. She is an arrogant Liberal with a majority government, she got that from the dumbest voters in the history of the province, maybe even the country. She's a hueg contributor to Canada's bad numbers across the board as well.
abtrapper - you were "in a store in Ontario" with 16' of shelf space. I was recently in a LCBO store (Bathurst, north of 401) that had several floor to ceiling shelves of French wine - Bordeaux, Cote de Rhone, etc - hundreds of different wines per region per country times several countries. Their port selection - impressive. Their scotch selection - pretty decent.
If you are going to criticise LCBO you need more than anecdotal information from one small store featuring 16' of shelf space.
For the wine grower, clearly there is a problem here. Growers should approach LCBO as a group with the goal of improving Ontario's share of wine sales by, in part, reducing charges at the winery. Someone has taken the time to visit a winery in Ontario. Don't tax the crap out of them.
BTW I've been to beer stores in Alberta. The most common being a guy with a beat up truck and a couple of coolers in the back "featuring" Labatts 50 (you can still buy that stuff, or is it vintage?). You approach the truck very cautiously until he speaks to you in a Newfoundland accent and then you know it's the real thing. Beer in the back, fish in the front.
Crap. Bayview Village not Bathurst. And the Newfie liquor store may have been in B.C. but they're both red-neck states so you can appreciate the confusion.
Yes I was in an LCBO in a city of 100k. After I drove around for awhile I stopped and asked where I might find a liquor store. I was told that there were four (4)
available. Once I found one the clerk asked me if I had an Air Miles card (I don't ). Why would a government monopoly offer AM's?
So, good for Bathurst north of 401. It doesn't alter the facts. Ontario suffers from lack of store selection and product.
I'm calling you on the liquor store pickup truck with a fishmonger running it steve.
Where is it and when did you see it? Not here in AB.
I agree that privately owned liquor stores in Alberta may not measure up to the opulent government owned stores in Ontario, but what we might lack in opulence we make up in selection.
You should get an Air Miles card
I've been in several others in my end of the city. Their selections were even worse.
At least with the ALCB, one could easily go from one store to another and find much the same selection, though not necessarily in the same quantities. There were some stores, like the one I referred to earlier, that specialized in wine. I've yet to find one here in the city nowadays that comes even close.
Then again, with the ALCB, one had staff who were expected to know what was in stock and what a customer was referring to. Most of the private liquor outlets I've been to hire high school kids, most of whom are barely literate, and if I was to ask them about a certain variety of wine or cognag, would likely answer "Huh?"
So when does the Bronfmann family start selling bootleg moonshine..like they did during prohibition?
Cheers
Hans Rupprecht, Commander in Chief
1st Saint Nicolaas Army
Army Group “True North”
You got me on the liquor store pick-up truck. It was a response to your 16 feet of shelf space at LCBO which does not represent the average store. I can drive west for 20 minutes to Guelph and find excellent selection, thousands of different wines. I drive 20 minutes south to Milton and similar selection. I drive 15 minutes drive east to Acton, a small town of 10,000 and I have over 10 scotches to choose from plus a small vintages section of hundreds of different wines, from Australia, South Africa, France, Italy, Spain, Germany, Argentina, Chile, and yes even Ontario. They also sell beer, vodka, rum, rye, gin, port etc. It is hard to find a crappy LCBO.
I have purchased wine in B.C., Alberta, Ontario, Quebec, Nova Scotia and Newfoundland. I have never seen a selection similar to Ontario's LCBO.
But, do they screw the wineries? Probably.
I've also been to some pretty crappy liquor stores in Italy and France. They are often cramped, have only local selection, lower cost wines, with bottles baking in the sun and standing upright.
Some people are thinking of moving to Canada, seeing as how the US is tripping on the progressive potholes. They don't realize that Canada is not quite perfect. They may have a "Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms", but no constitution is worth the paper it's written on unless the government abides by it. See, for example, the Chinese constitution, which guarantees everyone just abut the same rights as we have.
I saw Alberta go private even if the Alberta liqueur board still has their hands in it. It is stil better than Ontario and their big brother approach. Honestly, bible belting states are more liberal.
Hey let's hear it for the LCBO and government liquor stores. All together now
HIP HIP..whore Rae. (scarc naturally)
If you want 100% Canadian wine from Canadian grapes then buy only wines with the "VQA" label. It is usually prominently displayed on the front.
Ken -I'm not convinced that VQA means what they would like you to think it means. It's no guarantee that the product is 100% grown in a designated location but rather is from or produced in a certain local. Sort of like champagne coming from the Champagne region of France.
I recently read somewhere this week (?) of
a court case where the VQA association (ON)took a fellow vintner to court (and lost) over the use of the location of his winery. Apparently the VQA thinks it owns the right to place names?
Doesn't sound like they are as concerned about the content of their wine as they are about a non member using the local of his winery to advertise his whereabouts.
Even in Alberta the availability of product is politically driven, given that the warehouse which allows and makes product available is still ALBC and ALCB Union.
I learned this when I acquired a taste for a particular Saskatchewan beer and then failing to get that a particular B.C. beer.
Both breweries still make their beer, but the ALCB warehouse won't stock them so as to make them available to Alberta's various private liquor stores to sell them to customers.
Private, Free market, ...tish tosh, tis but an illusion.
Our lives are lived on the vagaries of government control and don't imagine it is otherwise.
In an effort to protect the local micro brewers red rachael has attempted to erect barriers. Steam Wistle from ON has taken the AB government to court over these barriers and is predicted to win. The ndp are putting on a brave front here but the truth is they have messed up another industry.
So yes we do live on the vagaries of government control.
I make my own beer ... and make wine for my lady. Fcuk the government ... no tax in BC for "food" ... which beer and wine ingredients are.
Exactly. Being a homebrewer myself, my beer is a lot cheaper than what's available in the stores.
this is the crap you get when you embrace socialism/communism.
KenK, and abtrapper - just came across this.
http://news.nationalpost.com/news/ontario-winery-wins-right-to-tell-consumers-where-its-located-after-battle-with-vqa
Looks like VQA are no different than any other parasites who have been granted a government monopoly.
Let me first state that I am no great fan of the LCBO (or the principle of government alcohol monopolies in general). So this is not meant as a defence of that institution.
However, while doing a contract job in Alberta for over a month this spring I had the opportunity to frequent a variety of independent beer and wine stores which ranged from local "one off" operations to bigger chains like Coop and Sobeys. I found the prices higher than Ontario, and, in not a few instances, quite considerably higher (e.g., the same 500ml can of imported beer costing me over a dollar more or a bottle of Californian cab sauv costing two or even three dollars more). I'm guessing two factors are at play:
1. the size of the market is much smaller than in Ontario as is the buying power of an Alberta chain or store when compared to the megalithic LCBO; and
2. notwithstanding its withdrawal from the sale of alcohol, the Alberta government (like all provincial governments in Canada) keeps its hand in the till with punitive taxes on every product, thus limiting the ability of private stores to routinely offer better pricing.
I will say that when the stores in Alberta do put on sales of selected products, they at least offer true reductions like six dollars on a bottle of wine vice a measly dollar or two at the LCBO. And it's nice to see the British practice of offering discounts on volume purchasing too (say, 10 percent off when you buy six bottles or a case). The only other place in Canada where I see this at the SAQ in Québec.
But, across the board, I saw neither cheaper prices nor greater selection in Alberta.
I learned everything I need to know about the LCBO from a liquor store in Florida. Walgreens I think it was.
I bought (2) 1.75L bottles of cheap vodka and got change from a U.S. $20 bill.
One bottom shelf bottle 1.75L vodka at the LCBO was $54.75.
Its beyond outrageous and I refuse to spend a dime there or the Brewers Retail. I get my trucker friends to bring me back a bottle once in a while.
Did the same when I smoked. Indian reserve or U.S. bring backs for me.
I quit drinking altogether, so I have no dog in this fight. My liver is very happy too.
However, you look at that pie chart that breaks down the price of a bottle. More than 50% tax and fees, right? If you start digging in to almost any food or product in Canada, you put together a chart of all the fees, tarries, eco-tomfoolery and whatnot, you start to see a pie chart that looks the same. Everything you buy is taxed off-screen where you can't see it, and then they tack on HST up front and pretend that's all you're paying.
Random example, compare a pair of UnderArmor shorts. Cheaper in the USA, even after you account for the CDN dollar. Why? Pie chart. There's all kinds of sh1t built into that Canadian price that the Americans don't have to deal with.
One party did not make it that way. It's been a collaborative effort that has built on itself since McKenzie King was Prime Minister. All parties have pushed it forward to where it is now. Three flavors of the same thing, all moving together.
What would it take to make that back up and go the other way? Probably something I don't want to live through.
My solution? Quit drinking. I also understand that making beer is very similar to baking bread, pretty easy solution to the LCBO.
"Both breweries still make their beer, but the ALCB warehouse won't stock them so as to make them available to Alberta's various private liquor stores to sell them to customers."
The liquor warehouse receives product on consignment. They pay for the product only as it is sold to the liquor stores. They do not promote product. I can't see any reason why they would not carry a particular product. Being in the warehouse does not put the product on liquor store shelves. Unless a brewery has a sales rep visiting the liquor stores convincing them to order nothing is leaving the warehouse. I suspect the breweries think it sounds like way more work than the systems in the other 9 provinces.
Actually, there are no "beer stores" in Alberta....that must have been back.in the old days. For wine selection of vintage there is Crow foot liquor, for good pricing there's Costco liquor stores...with a decent selection...including their Kirkland branded wines.
I'll take Ab selection over the overpriced LCBO any day....and most out here,are open everyday till at least 1Am...with some 24 hrs/day...
Won't see that in Wynne country
This sounds like the Canadian Wheat Board model all over again