Comment

Comment by Jonathan Luiten on August 15, 2010 at 3:35pm

Thanks George!

Comment by George Phiniotis on August 15, 2010 at 8:28am

Wine law is, at very least confusing, at most redundant and contradictory. Liquor control and taxation is primarily regulated by the federal government, but also by provincial, municipal and organizations including the BC Wine Authority.
When I have a question this is the website I go to...
http://www.winelaw.ca

Comment by Jonathan Luiten on August 14, 2010 at 8:53pm

All of these are great comments, George's especially. As an "outsider", there is much to the LCLB's way of thinking that, even a layperson, would have huge question marks flying out of his head as if in a cartoon - followed by an @#&! and a skull and crossbones.

George talks about consequences to doing business - I see merit in that - there's always a cost. But can anyone advise me as to what type of consequences? Fines? If so, how high? Pulling of the license? If so, how long? All things I'm interested in knowing as an Insurer for more than half of the Province's wineries.

Comment by Liam Carrier, IconWines.ca on August 11, 2010 at 11:22pm

Keep up the good work Winecouver. I'm studying wine with the ISG folks and one night our instructor's replacement was a former-ISG teacher, now-BCLDB manager who upon being questioned by the students on the ridiculously high import tax/mark-up (125%) replied "well, you don't see anyone leaving the Province over this." Well, maybe we will...
... but where to go? Ontario has similar problems - LCBO monopoly. I was just in Niagara and was absolutely amazed that there are no VQA stores out there (or anywhere in Ont for that matter).
One of the things I love about wine tasting in Naramata is that if you run out of time you can always head to the big VQA store in Penticton and pick-up wines that you missed but wanted to try. Nothing like that in Niagara. Plus, there are only a couple decent LCBO-Vintages stores on the peninsula. One winery exec told me, "I wish we had BC's problems". But the grass is always greener...

Comment by Winecouver on August 6, 2010 at 10:38am

Hi George. We (my fiancée and I) don't work in the industry, but perhaps one day we might. We've put lots of time towards WSET eduction (starting the Diploma in the fall), and we absolutely love wine. However, the BC Governments' regulations are constantly pushing me to pursue a wine career in a less interventionist state, either in the US or Australia. If that's our attitude, what of other people who want to pursue a career in wine? Do we want a BC wine culture where tasting and education options are limited to Wolf Blass facings served out of plastic glasses at a Signature store? Do we want to lose the best and brightest to other more wine-friendly nations and societies?

Anyway, that's the reason we've published an article like this. We need to educate the wine public of BC. I'll leave it to some far more senior industry people to figure out the political angle.

On that note, we'd love to hear more government insanity stories as fodder for our articles.

Glad to hear you're bucking the trend and using Riedel in your tasting room. :-)

Comment by George Phiniotis on August 6, 2010 at 7:51am

As with all things government, I'm sure somebody thought it was a good idea at the time...20 years ago. Anytime someone tries to improve their service they are there to tell you it's not allowed. I have refused to serve wine in plastic glasses on more than one occasion, even standard tasting glasses don't do a wine justice. In our tasting room you'll only ever get Reidel Bordeaux glasses, big reds are aerated during service to open them up, on demand. What to do? Give your customers the very best without exception, if there are consequences, be ready to accept them as the cost of doing business I suppose. LCLB, LDB and VQA seem to continuously forget without us they do not have a reason to exhist. What to do? Try sticking your fingers in your ears and sing La La La "I can't hear you" La La La.
Works for me!