New beer rules won't help everyone, says local craft brewery

Although the Ontario government says it is making it easier for craft breweries to sell at the Beer Store, the new rules won’t help one Sault Ste. Marie upstart. At least not in the short run.

Vaughn Alexander, co-owner of Outspoken Brewery in downtown Sault Ste. Marie, said those new rules won’t favour most small craft breweries.

“For our business at our stage it doesn’t help at all. They will only accept packaging and smaller bottles and we don’t do that,” said Alexander.

Instead, Outspoken will be opening their retail store on Queen Street on May 1, selling half-litre growlers of beer.

“That’s your growler to keep. You come back and fill it with whatever variety we have on tap at the time and walk out the door,” said Alexander.

With their limited capacity to produce beer, expensive bottles and the packaging that go with them wouldn’t make sense.

“We can put our beer into the beer store, but for the actual customer, if I go to the beer store am I looking for a craft beer? Not likely,” he said.

What Alexander would like to see is the Beer Store open up to selling kegs from craft breweries.

“That’s where every micro-brewery starts, for the most part,” he said.

Amongst new rules announced yesterday, select grocery stores will be allowed to sell beer.

Sault Ste. Marie MPP David Orazietti said there will be a bidding process for grocery stores to pull from the approximately 450 licenses available.

“There will be a process whereby we seek the highest licensing price we can garner because those revenues go toward health care and education and other important services,” he said.

As a consumer, Alexander welcomes the addition to grocery store shelves, which are already available in markets like Michigan and Quebec.

“You don’t have to go far outside Ontario to find that,” he said.

(FILE PHOTO: Vaughn Alexander seen with business partner Graham Atkinson at Outspoken Brewery. Kenneth Armstrong/SooToday)