Ontario grocery stores — particularly smaller, independent shops — say new bottle return requirements that were sprung on them a week before they’re set to take effect may make it impossible to participate in Premier Doug Ford’s expansion of alcohol sales. […]

Grocery stores […] that sell alcohol will also have to accept empties.

Having the smell of stale beer mingling with the smell of fresh food — and having to put not-quite-entirely-empty bottles that become fruit-fly magnets near produce sections — would not be good for business, they said.

But with new and detailed requirements communicated to them this week by the Liquor Control Board of Ontario just days before they begin, retailers say they don’t know how they will make it work, and some are planning to hand back their licences.

  • @StopTouchingYourPhoneOP
    15•25 days ago

    If I understand it right, convenience stores are exempt from recycling requirements, and it looks like the real losers in this deal are independent grocers.

    Mike Sharpe, who runs a store in Campbellford, got one of the new licences set to take effect Thursday. But after seeing the new rules, he said he will not be participating.

    “The idea of having a huge back room where we’re sorting and doing this makes no sense,” he said.

    “Everything sounded great, so we applied, and then every day since they’ve issued a licence, the deal has gotten worse for us.”

    • @FireRetardant
      12•25 days ago

      If you want to sell alcohol and get those juicy profits, you should have to do the bottle return, no exceptions. If you can’t make that profitable, don’t sell the alcohol.

      • @[email protected]
        19•25 days ago

        While I don’t disagree, it’s the fact that the government changed the rules, and on short notice. If grocers had known they would need to collect, clean, and package returns, many would have made different decisions.

        • @[email protected]English
          9•25 days ago

          Help Ford with his populist, abusive election campaign, and get fucked. Once a drug pusher, always a drug pusher.