The Ontario government is aggressively withholding key details about its large stockpile of American alcohol products, valued at approximately $79.1 million at cost, that were pulled from store shelves as an act of retaliation in the ongoing Canada-U.S. trade dispute.
In August, CBC News filed a freedom-of-information request to the Liquor Control Board of Ontario (LCBO), seeking the fate, size and disposal plans for U.S. alcohol products removed in March. The LCBO took 64 days to respond — 34 days longer than the 30-day limit allowed by law.
When the documents were finally released, they spanned 50 pages, but were heavily redacted. Most of the information about how much inventory is at risk of expiring, how much has already been destroyed and the total cost to taxpayers remains hidden.
I don’t understand why simply future stock was just not cancelled along with any current shipments, letting current remaining stock just “dry up” and not get restocked.
The public could have even bought the remaining stock and just poured it out while capturing it in a TickTok video.
It seems like such a waste of time and resources to “pull items off the shelf” for a business. You need to pay staff to take it off the shelf, pack it up, and then take time and effort to truck it back somewhere. Adding to all this transportation costs and the pulling it off a truck and restocking it somewhere. And now storage costs as well…
The stock was already paid for by the LCBO if I am not missing something blatantly obvious. The LCBO now has a quantity of already purchased stock they can’t sell, and paying storage costs for.
Pulling the product sent a message.
The message might not have worked the way Ontarians wanted, but it was definitely a strong message.
LCBO is so big, they only pay their supplier once it has been sold. Most of the stuff we are holding is still owned by the suppliers.
If this is the case then I agree with pulling it off the shelf. Thank you for clarifying this point.
Druggie’s probably selling the good stuff under the table to all his buddies.
