The Bar Towel

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/new-bruns ... -1.3554908

Good news for people in NB. The group who funded this guy's defence wants it to go to the Supreme Court, which would affect the laws in all of Canada. Poor Terry David Mulligan couldn't even get arrested doing this a couple years ago in B.C. This guy was fined in 2012.

While I like it, can someone fight the Ontario monopoly on international beers?

Masterplan wrote:While I like it, can someone fight the Ontario monopoly on international beers?

Hells yes. This needs to be done. I think the argument needs to built around access to beer not deemed worthy of carrying by the LCBO instead of the whole convenience push. I don't care how many stores sell the same the same shitty brands, I want acces to other brands. Period.

Alpha10 wrote:

Masterplan wrote:While I like it, can someone fight the Ontario monopoly on international beers?

Hells yes. This needs to be done. I think the argument needs to built around access to beer not deemed worthy of carrying by the LCBO instead of the whole convenience push. I don't care how many stores sell the same the same shitty brands, I want acces to other brands. Period.

True, but access to the stuff we want will not happen until widespread availability of the stuff 95% of the population drinks in ALL stores. At that point, the general public is accustomed to buying beer/wine/liquor with their groceries (a big cultural shift) ... stores gain profitability ... independents (the kind of store that WILL stock what we want) will then become viable businesses.

Face it, chain grocery stores are in the volume business. The stuff we want doesn't sell in large volume. It will take small, independent shops, to fill the niche of selling To Ol, Mikkeller, Cigar City, Founders ... and the like. That won't happen until distribution channels outside LCBO/TBS and the legal framework improve

It will take time. Its difficult to hit the ground running from a standing start - especially with so much bureaucracy still in place. Look at the number of years its taken for the craft movement in the province to take root.

The 100% markeup NB has on beers brought back from the US (under 48 hours) is a FAR bigger crime against humanity than the police stopping some dude with craploads of Coors Light.

rejtable wrote:The 100% markeup NB has on beers brought back from the US (under 48 hours) is a FAR bigger crime against humanity than the police stopping some dude with craploads of Coors Light.

Where can one read about this markup? I may be doing a border crossing from US into NB next month and would like to know their provincial "rules".

I was being a slight bit loose with the term markeup, markeup is actually only one component of the pricing.

As long as you are in the states 48 hours, you have the same personal exemptions as anywhere. But if less than 48, DO NOT CROSS INTO NB, or don't buy beer.

You can find all the details in Memorandom D2-3-6. For every import (non-commercial) outside the exception, you have three components:

1. Duty: same across the country...$31.22 per hectolitre. That's litres/100, so 8L is 0.08hl and the duty on that would be $2.50.
2. Taxes, varies by province, but for NB it's the HST. You pay that on the value (US value I think). So let's you bought 8L worth $200, your HST would be $26.
3. Provincial markeup... here's the serious shitkicker, for NB it's 82% of the US value, so your $200 beer has a markeup of $164!!!!!! Note in ON it's 67.6 cents per litre, PQ is even better at around 40 cents.

So, your 8L of $200 US beer would cost you $192 CDN to bring across the border in NB. Given that $200USD is considerable less than that in CDN right now, your actual total fee is quite a bit higher than 100% so I was even shortchanging the robbery. So, again, I said 100% markeup just to make it easy to communicate. The actual markeup is a bargain at 82%, fckers.

That same order coming back to ON would run you just shy of $34.

DO NOT CROSS A BORDER WITHOUT AN EXEMPTION INTO NB!!!

Here is the relevant CBSA Document. Markeup is detailed in Appendix B:

http://www.cbsa-asfc.gc.ca/publications ... 6-eng.html

And also in case anyone asks, this has nothing to do with your province of residence. All applicabe duties//taxes/markeups are based on the point of crossing.

That's pretty crazy...thanks for the link though.
I won't have much beer with me when I cross, but it will be less than 48 hours...so who knows what'll happen!