Fredericton (October 27, 2020) – Liberal Opposition Finance Critic Rob McKee believes that Alcool NB Liquor should be doing more to support the province’s craft alcohol industry.

“The industry is rightly critical of the crown corporation for its policies that are adding significant costs to these businesses, making it harder to turn a profit and grow their businesses”, said McKee.

McKee referenced a social media post by the President of the New Brunswick Craft Alcohol Producers Association who will be meeting with the Minister responsible for ANBL to discuss the concerns of the industry.

ANBL requires that craft alcohol producers must deliver their product to a central storage location where they must pay significant storage fees.

According to the social media post, ANBL charges craft alcohol producers almost 3 times what Ontario is charging its producers for storage and unlike Ontario producers, New Brunswick producers must cover transportation costs. Additionally, recent changes to the process for registering product make producers wait almost 10 times longer than under the previous process.

“This hardly seems fair”, said McKee. “ANBL should be doing everything it can to support small business, not gouging producers on fees and making it harder to do business. This industry has created hundreds of jobs throughout the province and has the potential to create many more. These are businesses located in both urban and rural New Brunswick and they play an important role in our economy”.

McKee is urging the Minister of Finance to listen to the concerns of the craft alcohol industry and address them.