小蓝视频 has made great strides in liberalizing its liquor laws in the past dozen years, but red tape remains.
Back in 2014, 小蓝视频 was the .
Then-premier Christy Clark also snipped red tape by culling a regulation that banned customers from being able to carry alcoholic beverages from one licensed area of an establishment to another, such as from a restaurant to an adjoining lounge .
One example of lingering red tape is that restaurants are not allowed to buy alcohol from privately run stores. but he never actually made the change.
If a restaurant runs out of a wine, its staff cannot go to a nearby wine store to stock up and buy a few bottles.
They must buy directly from the British Columbia Liquor Distribution Branch.
This can inflate restaurants’ inventory costs and restrict them from offering niche products.
If restaurateurs want to buy special listings, for example, they must buy a full case of wine instead of individual bottles.
When buying less than a case of wine, the options tend to be widely available products that consumers know almost too well, and know the prices, restaurateurs say.
“It’s not ideal if someone can see the wine on a shelf priced at $20 and then I’m selling it for $60,” said Sarah McCauley, corporate wine director at Glowbal Restaurant Group.
She said she would like to be able to go to boutique wine stores, such as Marquis Wine Cellars, and speak with knowledgeable staff who can guide her to quality wines that are less well known.
Inventory costs would be substantially less if restaurateurs were able to test new products by buying only a few bottles to start, McCauley told BIV.
Marquis Wine Cellars owner John Clerides has long lobbied the 小蓝视频 government for the ability to sell directly to restaurants.
“If you’re a young person and you want to open a wine bar, you’re going to have to buy 20 cases of wine at $40 per bottle,” he said. “That is versus going to a private store and being able to buy two or three bottles of each wine. What’s the difference in the cost of opening? It’s massive.”
Government slow to implement all liquor-panel recommendations
Eby was attorney general in 2017, when he created the Business Technical Advisory Panel (Liquor Policy).
That panel released aimed at streamlining 小蓝视频’s liquor-distribution system.
Allowing restaurants to buy products directly from private liquor stores was one of the panel’s recommendations.
BIV asked the 小蓝视频 government why the measure was not implemented, and it responded that it conducted a thorough review of the panel’s recommendations in 2022 and “potential policy, labour, financial and trade implications.”
The government added that “it was determined at that time there would be no changes made to the current model.”
Many of the panel’s recommendations were implemented.
“The most significant thing that was done was introducing wholesale pricing for hospitality customers,” the panel’s chair, Mark Hicken, told BIV.
That change came in the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic.
"This is the most important and significant liquor policy change in a generation, .
Before that, restaurants had to pay full retail prices for their inventory.
If restaurant owners were allowed to buy wines from private stores, the prices for those sales would be at whatever levels the two parties agree on, but likely at least slightly higher than the wholesale price.
