Early this past December I was just outside Fredericton city limits at Sunset Heights Meadery talking with owner John Way about the fact that he was the sole dedicated meadery in the province.
In the second floor of his garage I found myself in a room similar to many I’ve been in before with my father, surrounded by large stainless steel fermenters, bottling stations, empty kegs begging to be filled, and crates of product ready for market. I was working on a story about him and his business, but this is where I finally found a starting point for another story I had in the back of my mind for the last two years, but never knew where to start.
I asked him if he had any plans to sell his mead through NB Liquor and he responded with an explanation of why at that point in time he had no plans to do so. Way told me that for a product like mead the mark-ups which NB Liquor puts in place would make it so he would have to choose between either making little to no money off of his product and have people buy it, or make a reasonable profit but the price on the shelf be so high that not many could afford it.
This irked me because I come from a place where creativity in craft alcohol is prized, and if the first meadery to be established in New Brunswick can’t have reasonable access to the main alcohol market then it would seem like the system does not support diversification or the development of the local alcohol industry.
I am not usually one to be interested by business practices, but I originally went to the meadery with a positive outlook on the industry because it seemed like it was catching up. I left frustrated because it was clear that it wasn’t the people making the alcohol who were stuck in their ways, it was the main provider of alcohol that was.
Last month my friend Johnny Cullen and I put together a story for radio on NB Liquor and, and we got to sit down with the president of NB Liquor, Brian Harriman, and the owner of Picaroons, Sean Dunbar. Also on the show, we hosted Adam Clawson, the owner of New Brunswick’s first craft cidery and founder of the New Brunswick Craft Alcohol Producers Assosiation (NB CAPA).
Clawson told me that he saw a need for his cider when he saw how unavailable different liquors are in this province.
“The intention for NB CAPA was to create an association that didn’t just cater to one section of alcohol in New Brunswick. We’re a small province it would be great if all of the craft producers who are going through pretty much the same issues on a day-to-day basis could all work together,” Clawson said.
We were thrilled to have been able to interview these people, but I think there’s more to the story that him and I need to cover. We went into the interviews knowing the markups were too high, and we knew the NB Liquor president would do his best to shed light on a conveniently chosen set of facts. In fact, we had to send a copy of our interview questions in ahead of time so that NB Liquor could carefully plan their answers. And even though we went live on air with our findings, I don’t think we reached or convinced enough people.
I’m not usually one to be an activist, but I know that there are enough drinkers in this province and even enough drinkers eager for diversity to do something about the current state of things here. I love craft alcohol, just as many others do, and if I was on the ol’ Twitter I might even start a #downwiththemarkups or #increaseincentives hashtag.
Sean Dunbar said he’s still feeling out the education phase between with NB Liquor and Picaroons.
“I think more direct access by consumers to specialty beer is probably the next thing, we just have to free up the congestion through the NB Liquor system,” Dunbar said.
In my opinion, ideally, alcohol would be sold from any store willing to pay for a permit, but there seems to be a large cluster of red tape in the way of that, at least for a while.
