mhicken March 22nd, 2010
Interesting story on Bloomberg.com this morning by Elin McCoy on the continuing fallout on Bordeaux prices following Diageo’s withdrawal as the major supplier of Bordeaux to the North American market. Canadian buyers and agents have largely been insulated from the effects of this due to our monopoly distribution systems which do not easily allow market driven price fluctuations. However, I am sure there are many Canadian lovers of Bordeaux who are taking advantage of the situation by buying product south of the border.
Tags: bordeaux, cross-border, diageo, liquor boards, prices, wine marketing
mhicken July 31st, 2009
In a move of breathtaking hostility towards both the BC wine industry and Alberta wine consumers, the Alberta liquor board has recently threatened BC wineries with “criminal enforcement” action if they ship wine from BC into Alberta. The legal justification for this? An 80 year old prohibition era law which on its face prohibits all movement of liquor across provincial borders (even, for example, the act of carrying a single bottle of wine across the border with you for personal consumption). Many lawyers think the law is unconstitutional but it’s still on the books. Message to all federal and provincial politicians … help! Canadian wine consumers need to be rescued from our provincial liquor boards. Theoretically, we, as taxpayers, own the liquor boards. You would think that there might be more accountability in terms of consumer needs … unfortunately, revenue is pretty much the sole consideration.
More information from the wineries perspective is on this site:
http://johnschreiner.blogspot.com/
More information from a legal perspective is here:
http://www.winelaw.ca/cms/
Tags: aglc, bc, laws, liquor boards, shipping, wine, wineries
