The B.C. government’s start date for allowing grocers to sell alcohol is just over two months away, but consumers will be disappointed if they expect to add beer, wine or spirits to grocery carts starting April 1.
“We don’t know what’s going to happen until the government tells us, and they haven’t really been that clear,” Jim Pattison Group (JPG) president Glen Clark told Business in Vancouver.
“They’ve said that grocery stores can sell wine, which we’re delighted with, but we don’t know how.”
JPG owns Save-On-Foods, Overwaitea, Nesters Market, Buy-Low Foods and Meinhardt Fine Foods.
Attorney General Suzanne Anton has outlined two possible ways that grocers can sell beer, wine or spirits. The first would be a store-within-a-store model whereby a grocery would have to be at least 10,000 square feet and have a separate section designated for alcohol sales.
The second would require a grocer to apply for a licence to carry B.C. wine on store shelves. But Anton has yet to detail how many of the in-aisle licences will be available or how a grocer gets one.
Clark said the store-within-a-store model would be virtually impossible to execute because government regulations, with few exceptions, allow it only if the grocery store is at least one kilometre from a liquor outlet.
“There’ll be very few grocery stores selling wine if the geographic restriction is maintained,” he said.
Choices Markets CEO Ishkandar Ahmed agreed.
He said that only two of his seven stores are more than one kilometre from a liquor store. One of those is less than 10,000 square feet and therefore too small to sell alcohol.
City regulations ban alcohol sales at the other location, on West 16th Avenue.
The City of Vancouver requires all alcohol retailers to be at least 100 metres from a school or church. The Choices on West 16th Avenue is across the street from a church.
“I couldn’t say for sure what we’re going to be able to do,” Thrifty Foods communications manager Erin Coulson told BIV. “It seems that there are a few steps that need to be done [by the government to clarify the process].”
She estimated that only one of Thrifty Foods’ 26 stores would likely be both large enough and far enough away from a liquor store to be eligible to sell alcohol using the store-within-a-store model.
Even then, Thrifty Foods would have to buy and relocate a liquor licence from another business that already has a licence, which could be an expensive proposition.
Coulson is “excited” by the in-aisle option as well but said there needs to be more clarity on how to get a licence.
Add to this a legal wrinkle.
Wine industry lawyer Mark Hicken told BIV that Victoria’s plan to expand preferential treatment for B.C. wines beyond the current network of 21 stores which exclusively sell B.C. Vintners Quality Alliance products would contravene the Canada-European Community Wine and Spirits Agreement.
“I don’t think the government’s plan is trade-agreement-compliant,” he said. “You’d be opening Canada up to a potential trade agreement challenge, which I think we would lose. That could mean financial penalties.” •
