Booze bill affecting rural hotel owners leaves heads spinning

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This article was published 13/03/2019 (2576 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The province giveth with one hand and taketh away with the other, the Manitoba Rural Hotel Association says.

The provincial government has tabled a bill that will let rural hotel owners expand their liquor vendor product line with coolers and ciders. Previously, only urban hotel vendors could sell those products.

However, the government is seeking to allow private liquor outlets — found in many rural grocery stores — to sell single-serving domestic beer (such as the extra large “king can”), opening a new area of competition between liquor marts and rural hotels.

King-can beer, which start at a size of 473 millilitres (compared to a regular 355-millilitre can), is a significant market for rural hotels.

“They’ve given us something but they’re also taking something away,” said Angelo Mondragon, association president and owner of the Notre Dame Hotel in Notre Dame de Lourdes, about 110 kilometres west of Winnipeg.

The province’s prohibition against cooler and cider sales by rural hotel vendors has been contentious. In 2012, the then-NDP government allowed 110 hotel vendors in urban locations to sell products such as Smirnoff Ice and Mott’s Clamato Caesar, but not 140 rural hotel vendors. The move was meant to protect grocery-store liquor outlets.

Mondragon said he appreciates that the current Tory administration has rectified the discrepancy, but wondered about the effect of letting rural liquor outlets sell single-serving beer: “Is that just robbing Peter to pay Paul?”

Meanwhile, Manitoba Hotel Association president Scott Jocelyn believes the changes will help rural hotel owners.

“We’re hoping the gain is more than the loss,” he said Tuesday, adding the association is also working to help some rural members sell cannabis in the future.

At least 20 rural hotel vendors have been pre-qualified to sell cannabis, he said. That means once the dust settles on the first wave of retail outlets, the province will look at giving out licences in areas not being served. That could mean new opportunities for rural hotels, which are already handling a controlled substance, so long as its municipality approves.

“If someone is going to retail it, why not rural hotels?” Jocelyn said.

He said rural hotel beverage rooms and vendors are important to their communities but they need more revenue streams “to support all the great things they’re doing, all the people they’re employing, all the taxes they’re collecting.”

Liquor marts in towns without a hotel vendor can sell beer.

The Manitoba Hotel Association said consumers will benefit from the latest change. For example: during camping season, people are often looking for coolers and ciders but haven’t been able to get them from hotel beer vendors and they often can’t get them from grocery-store liquor marts because they close by 6 p.m. and may not be open on Sundays.

Manitoba liquor laws require legislative changes to permit rural hotel vendors to sell coolers and ciders, but only require an administrative change to liquor-store rules.

bill.redekop@freepress.mb.ca