beerindustry





toc =Beer Industry in Ontario=

Price Difference
As most people living around the Quebec and United States border know that beer prices are lower. Well there many factors that actually contribute to this. In Ontario the supply of Alcohol is publicly run (for the most part although the beer store is private) which typically raises the price of Alcohol. However this is not always the case because someone from Alberta pays around 5 dollars more on a case of beer than in Ontario. The Ontario government has policies of sin tax and price floor on beer to reduce consumption. It is actually the responsibility of the LCBO to set the minimum price to mandate social responsibility about consumption. The price difference of Alcohol as simply explained is about reducing presumed overindulgence resulting from cheaper alcohol.

The Monopoly
The prices of beer are determined by several different organization. MADD being an example but its acting in good faith and promoting some of the more hard liners stances. This is not a problem if they have input in beer prices. The problem is how much control the Beer Industry in Ontario has over the price and regulations of beer. Consumption of beer has been relatively flat over the last couple decades in comparison to the significant rise in Wine consumption. Also there has been a significant rise in popularity of micro breweries that offer beer at relatively lower costs. Recently the price floor of beer has risen to 25.60 with a strong colleration to the Beer Industry itself. Labbatt, Molson and Sleeman own the beer store in its entirity and have almost a monoply in sales only minor competition is LCBO. When supplying restaruants and bars the beer store has a monoply in distribution and actively abuses that power by not supplying any discounts for quantity supplied. There have been many instances of bars losing their liqour lisences for crossing the quebec border and buying beer their because of the siginficant reductions in price. The worst part is that Molson, Labatt and Sleeman are not owned by Canadian companies anymore; Molson is owned by Americans, Labbat by Europeans and Sleeman by some Japanesse company. The strongest effort into breaking up the monoply by the Ontario Craft Brewers proved to be effortless and ended with some of the represented brewers not being able to sell their products in the Beer Store. In the end it will be up to the government to break up this monoply. The Liberals attempt to dodge the debate, the conservatives support private sellers and the NDP want the government to take over the Beer Store due to foriegn ownership.