The Beer Store Experiment

[atomeyes]

what if....
we went to one Beer Store location and ordered a whole bunch of a brand that isn't on their Big Ten list.
We kept on ordering and ordering ridiculous quantities.
Would that brand (for example, La Fin du Mond) make it to the Big Ten list? or is that list an advertising lie?

[Brewbert]

what if....
we went to one Beer Store location and ordered a whole bunch of a brand that isn't on their Big Ten list.
We kept on ordering and ordering ridiculous quantities.
Would that brand (for example, La Fin du Mond) make it to the Big Ten list? or is that list an advertising lie?

People still go to the beer store? lol.

Deer piss, deer piss everywhere.

The odd one may sell mad tom or some quebec brews but lol.



And to answer your question, probably not. I'd bet my testies it's advertising.

[PeenSteen]

what if....
we went to one Beer Store location and ordered a whole bunch of a brand that isn't on their Big Ten list.
We kept on ordering and ordering ridiculous quantities.
Would that brand (for example, La Fin du Mond) make it to the Big Ten list? or is that list an advertising lie?

I'm sure it is pre determined and will never change

[ErkLR]

what if....
we went to one Beer Store location and ordered a whole bunch of a brand that isn't on their Big Ten list.
We kept on ordering and ordering ridiculous quantities.
Would that brand (for example, La Fin du Mond) make it to the Big Ten list? or is that list an advertising lie?

I always assumed that was the Top 10 beers that TBS sold overall, rather than at whichever particular location. Before Labatt bought them, Lakeport Pilsner and Honey were in the Top 10 IIRC. The Pilsner is still there.

[Rob Creighton]

Would that brand (for example, La Fin du Mond) make it to the Big Ten list? or is that list an advertising lie?

Completely acceptable. The brand belongs to Sleeman - one of the partners.

[Rob Creighton]

Before Labatt bought them, Lakeport Pilsner and Honey were in the Top 10 IIRC. The Pilsner is still there.

Now you know why they are now owned by Labatt

[Belgian]

Re: Mad Tom,

Good price breaks on 12 and 24 bottle Muskoka packs. You won't get that at The Other Stupid Place.

[StevenThrasher]

I probably personally skew the "not from monopoly 3 owners" list at the Richmond Hill beer store a little bit. Mill Street Tankhouse is my staple session beer and I buy it more often than I'd like to admit to my liver.
(I can't drink Belgian Quads, IPAs and Imperial Stouts all that often nor can I afford the good ones in large quantities).

The convenience of the 24 packaging and returning the empties is what keeps me there as opposed to the LCBO.

[sprague11]

So i guess this 25 dollar gift card to tbs will be going toward mad tom.

[ErkLR]

Before Labatt bought them, Lakeport Pilsner and Honey were in the Top 10 IIRC. The Pilsner is still there.

Now you know why they are now owned by Labatt

Oh, I knew when they were bought out. I'm not sure Microsoft invented the "Buy them, rather than compete with them" technique, but I first heard about it through them.

This thread made me go and look up what a 24 of Lakeport costs now; it's about 1.15/bottle excluding deposit. Same for almost every other discount brand (including Blue). When did the lowest price creep up from 1.08?

[biegaman]

Would that brand (for example, La Fin du Mond) make it to the Big Ten list? or is that list an advertising lie?

The "Top Ten" is indeed not determined directly by actual sales amount (though it may not be too far off) but rather, put simply, the powers that be. Having worked there for 6 years, I can tell you that everything at TBS is subject to bidding wars. People say it's run by InBev/Molson Coors/Sapporo... it's actually their advertising execs that make the decisions.

[mintjellie]

Would that brand (for example, La Fin du Mond) make it to the Big Ten list? or is that list an advertising lie?

Completely acceptable. The brand belongs to Sleeman - one of the partners.

I'm sure you mean it belongs to Sapporo.

[Belgian]

La Fin du Mond

Completely acceptable. The brand belongs to Sleeman - one of the partners.

I'm sure you mean it belongs to Sapporo.

Yes - Sapporo owns Sleeman who had long since purchased Upper Canada and more recently Unibroue.

I'm John Sleeman. I do terrible radio ads. I hope you like them!

[adventures_alc]

I used to work at the London distribution center and I can promise you that there isn't enough physical quantity of other beers to be able to knock off one of the top 10 brands. You could order all of it and it wouldn't matter. It would be a drop in the ocean.

The Beer Stores warehouses are the 'secret' side of the business. Not only do they have the monopoly on beer sales, they also have a virtual monopoly on distribution to bars. If the beer store were a truly viable way to get products from the brewery into bars who ordered you'd see craft brewers using the warehouse more instead of buying their own trucks and hiring delivery guys.

In a perfect world a company like Beau's could have been distributing south of Toronto (I am in London) years ago with ease by taking advantage of the TBS warehouse and truck network.

I would like to see a "top 5 brewed in Ontario list" on the wall. It'll never happen (or it will be manipulated to include Blue, etc.).

[ErkLR]

Isn't that a bit of a chicken and egg thing though? People mostly know Molbatts, so that's what they ask for, so that's what bars/TBS locations mostly stock, so that's all people know and ask for.... etc. Why would the warehouse stock a tonne of something that's not going to move? If everyone in the neighbourhood decided to start buying Smashbomb from the Huron/Adelaide store, wouldn't they just start ordering more in?

Likewise if Beau's had paid the listing fees years ago (not that I'm arguing this is fair to them, I know it's designed to keep them out) at a few stores in London, wouldn't it have been here years ago?