Well, here's a different take

[Tapsucker]

Craft brewers prefer NOT to sell beer in convenience stores.

http://torontoist.com/2012/08/craft-bre ... eer-sales/

There are good points. Especially considering Quebec where the distribution is so dismal.

I still think the best small improvement would be to let craft brewers sell each other's products from their locations, or have their own offsite sales outlets. Kind of like an OCB take on the wine kiosks

[Cass]

Sigh. This is just this kind of thing that keeps us where we are.

As long as convenience stores are a free market, i.e. I can open up one if I would like, then you'll see craft beer in corner stores. It's all dictated by market demands. Look to Quebec & the States for plenty of convenience stores that have big brands, and tons and tons with lots of great selection.

[MatttthewGeorge]

I know the feeling from management at our brewery is right in line with this article.

That said, I fully disagree. For starters, just as there are craft beer bars, there will be craft beer convenience stores, just as Cass stated. It won't happen overnight, but eventually one convenience store will want to separate themselves from the others on the street. And in markets where there is a microbrewery it would be to an even greater extend. Obviously we sell more beer in the Guelph LCBOs & Beer Stores than in other cities, based on being local. Local convenience stores would be more likely to carry our product as compared to a convenience store in say, Mississauga. And I say that's great for the people of Guelph.

But most importantly, if micros would be hurt is not what this is about. This is about choice and freedom. I should have the freedom to shop where I want, sell what I want and deal with who I want. The role of government should never be as a player in any system, but as a referee. We don't have government run pharmacies; I am free to shop at whatever pharmacy I want and even open my own, given the right qualifications. Why do we have government run liquor stores?

Money. Pure and simple. Ditch all this social responsibility crap and ask yourself this question: If the LCBO had a 1.3 billion dollar deficit instead of a surplus, do you think we would still not be privatized?

[grub]

Yeah, it's sad to see them want to keep spinning their wheels in a broken system. Is opening corner store sales really any different from if we just had 2x the LCBO locations? What if tomorrow the LCBO decided they wanted to have "LCBOutiques" that were small locations with a few "core" brands? Would it really be any different?

I can understand some fear of going to the polar extreme: if the market was suddenly 100% open and you could get any beer from anywhere at any corner store... well then there's a massive influx of craft beer and it's logical to figure that the existing market would suffer, even if just temporarily. Heck, we do this now when the good seasonals come in - look at how fast the first batch of red racer flew off the shelves last summer. the whole shipment was gone over one weekend. wanna bet that the OCB brands took a sales hit that weekend?

I'm betting if you tracked something like weekly sales volume over the year you'd find spikes all over - spikes in non-OCB for red racer or other big brand seasonal releases, and spikes in OCB when one of them puts out something special. i'd also be willing to bet that over the course of a year these are minor blips that are barely noticed.

Regardless of the system, the strong will survive. Look how much ontario has evolved in the last, say, 5 years. craft is way up at the LCBO. we've got more and more local breweries doing more and more interesting and diverse brands. think of how much further this could go if you didn't have to find one of those 10 special LCBO locations stocking your product or make a run down to the brewery on the few days a beer is available.

the reality is that opening up boutiques or convenience stores or whatever you call them isn't going to suddenly double the sales volume overall and throw it all to the big guys. the volume will likely be the same, it'll just be more spread out. craft lovers are still going to hit the LCBO or a "good" corner store for their needs, but the market would (hopefully!) be more open so that those "good" corner stores could turn into amazing ones. it's not like all the craft drinkers are suddenly going to say "gee, i can get coors like 3 blocks closer, guess i don't need to go get some mad tom today".

to me, here's how I see the current options:

1) beer store. pay huge listing fees, maybe good for a few core brands but certainly not good for seasonals.

2) LCBO. massive hoops to jump through for their seasonals, but getting easier to get core brands in. individual stores can request certain products, but (afaik) can't turn the bulk of others away.

3) brewery. sell anything, anytime, no hoops, no extra overhead/fees/etc, but you're forced to staff it yourself and anyone not within driving distance is out of luck.

now, even assuming NO changes to importing, imagine option #4) corner store/boutique/etc. owner tailors selection to clients, bringing in as many or few brands as they like. maybe that means a few are just BMC, but others will become a "black oak east" or an "ocb north".

take it a step further, what if those stores could sell "non-official-lcbo stuff", ie the brewery-only seasonals we all know and love. 10 locations to buy 10 bitter years? project x on every corner? sounds great to me. how many people try random beers at the LCBO just because they're "new" and haven't seen them before? so many of them don't even know that there are brewery-only beers. but if those brews are now side-by-side with everything else then you have a whole new crop of customers, and that sounds like more sales to me.

so where's the problem?

[S. St. Jeb]

I've generally been supportive of the current system. No logical reason, probably just because my personality is generally small "c" conservative.

But I must say, the posts by MatttthewGeorge and grub make a lot of good points. If there was to be a change to the system, it would probably result in some initial chaos and confusion, but it would settle down into a new paradigm. In the big picture would it be better? Well, that would be a personal opinion and we can't predict for sure, but as I said, the last two posts make a lot of good points.

[Tapsucker]

Perhaps I shouldn't have kicked this off, because now I'm thinking: meh, just brew your own.

I hate skewed markets, but I also see how the big boys manipulate bar taps and don't want to see that at retail. Especially when I see the bleak Quebec retail scene. On the other hand, many micros have recently scored big tap placements, some far and wide, and that gives me hope for free markets.

[Belgian]

Sounds like a corporate form of Stockholm Syndrome, these Ontario Craft Brewers defending their captors.

Regardless of the system, the strong will survive. Look how much ontario has evolved in the last, say, 5 years. craft is way up at the LCBO. we've got more and more local breweries doing more and more interesting and diverse brands.

Craft has arrived in Ontario. Even moms-and-pops buying Beau's Lug Tread or Spearhead Hawaiian Style know there's something far better than Molson Canadian and Coors - no matter how cold Coors may taste. So corner store sales, craft, yes it will happen.

The role of government should never be as a player in any system, but as a referee.

- but can they be both player and referee? Will they just keep calling the plays in their favor, taking advantage of their power? They don't f-ck around when it comes to competition, even at times when backing off a bit might be good overall in the long run.

[Kel Varnsen]

I still think the best small improvement would be to let craft brewers sell each other's products from their locations, or have their own offsite sales outlets. Kind of like an OCB take on the wine kiosks

As far as the offsite outlets go I was thinking about something. I was in the Ottawa mill street location about a month ago, and in their retail shop they are clearly selling beer that was not produced at that location. The reason I could tell was that they were selling the mixed six packs, and I don't believe they have a bottling line. So it got me thinking, would there be anything to stop say Beau's from opening up a retail outlet in say Downtown Ottawa as basically a super tiny nano-brewery (like basically a large homebrew set up) and selling the beer they produce in Vankleek Hill there?

[Bytowner]

So it got me thinking, would there be anything to stop say Beau's from opening up a retail outlet in say Downtown Ottawa as basically a super tiny nano-brewery (like basically a large homebrew set up) and selling the beer they produce in Vankleek Hill there?

Speaking specifically of Beau's, not sure they'd be into that given the importance of community... at least for their brand. A mini-outlet in Ottawa would keep a lot of people away from Vankeek Hill. If it were a possibility I'd suggest the OCB should open up a couple nano-breweries (Toronto, Kingston, Ottawa) and use them as a one-stop-shop for every Ontario craft brewer's products. That would be sweet.

All of this assuming Mill Street isn't doing something not quite legal.

EDIT: Has anyone ever seen a craft brewer selling another brewer's product in their retail store?

[rejtable]

A mini-outlet in Ottawa would keep a lot of people away from Vankeek Hill.

They are happy enough to have homeless kids deliver beer to your home thus surely keeping tons of people away from Vankleek Hill.

[Kel Varnsen]

So it got me thinking, would there be anything to stop say Beau's from opening up a retail outlet in say Downtown Ottawa as basically a super tiny nano-brewery (like basically a large homebrew set up) and selling the beer they produce in Vankleek Hill there?

Speaking specifically of Beau's, not sure they'd be into that given the importance of community... at least for their brand. A mini-outlet in Ottawa would keep a lot of people away from Vankeek Hill. If it were a possibility I'd suggest the OCB should open up a couple nano-breweries (Toronto, Kingston, Ottawa) and use them as a one-stop-shop for every Ontario craft brewer's products. That would be sweet.

All of this assuming Mill Street isn't doing something not quite legal.

EDIT: Has anyone ever seen a craft brewer selling another brewer's product in their retail store?

Maybe it wouldn't work for beau's but there are a lot of breweries that are set up in kind of barren industrial areas (like in Toronto) that aren't really destinations. If one of them could set up like a nano-brewery in a urban area and then sell the beer they make in their main brewery I wonder how that would work. Especially since I remember reading somewhere that breweries are allowed to sell beer by the glass, so it could be like a mini brewery-bar.

As far as breweries selling other brewers products, I don't believe it is legal. I know the owner of the new Cassel brewery outside of Ottawa has said he would love to sell products from other regional breweries, since it would get people into his store, but the current rules do not allow it.

[cratez]

Glad to see I'm not the only one who's disappointed with the comments in that article.

[jcc]

Maybe it wouldn't work for beau's but there are a lot of breweries that are set up in kind of barren industrial areas (like in Toronto) that aren't really destinations. If one of them could set up like a nano-brewery in a urban area and then sell the beer they make in their main brewery I wonder how that would work. Especially since I remember reading somewhere that breweries are allowed to sell beer by the glass, so it could be like a mini brewery-bar.

Depends on the size of the Brewery. Less than 25000 hecs produced per year all beer sold at a retail store must be brewed on-site. Over 25000 hecs, 50% of beer sold must be made on-site. The following is quoted from the AGCO's Brewery Retail Store Information Guide (found here)

- If the applicant produces less than 25,000 hectolitres of beer per year, the applicant is eligible to apply for one on-site brewery retail store and all products sold at the brewery retail store must be made by the applicant at the production site where the brewery retail store is located

- If the applicant produces 25,000 hectolitres of beer or more per year, the applicant is eligible to apply for authorization to operate two brewery retail stores, provided that each brewery retail store is located at a production site of the applicant (as set out above) and provided that at least fifty per cent (50%) of the beer sold in each store is made by the applicant at the site of the retail store where it is being sold.

[Bytowner]

Depends on the size of the Brewery. Less than 25000 hecs produced per year all beer solid at a retail store must be brewed on-site. Over 25000 hecs, 50% of beer solid must be made on-site. The following is quoted from the AGCO's Brewery Retail Store Information Guide (found here)

Well that is effin' bizarre... or at least would be outside of Ontario.

They are happy enough to have homeless kids deliver beer to your home thus surely keeping tons of people away from Vankleek Hill.

Tiny difference between making your beer available and taking away any reason at all to visit your main brewery.

[rejtable]

Tiny difference between making your beer available and taking away any reason at all to visit your main brewery.

I have pretty much no reason to ever go to the main brewery now except for special events (Father's Day, Oktoberfest, etc) Do you? I guess I may miss out on a beer or two once in awhile, but ... meh.


They have also been pushing agressively to get their seasonals into the LCBO, another reason to never go to Vankleek. Their taps, including most of their seasonals are pretty easily accessible in Ottawa now, aren't they?

I suspect that the reasons they don't try something like we are talking about are many... risky investments, distraction from their core business model, legal hurdles, etc. I'm not saying that their love of Vankleek isn't playing a role in something like this, but I bet it has a lot more to do with capital, the government red tape and being pretty busy with the current brewery and its expansion.