Putting the focus on ingredients rather than
a strictly size- or volume-based de"nition places a
small-batch producer such as Victoria Spirits—which
produces around 7,000 litres a year from its family-
run microdistillery on Vancouver Island but gets its
NGS from Ontario—in the same category as multina-
tional Diageo, which produces¤6.5 billion litres of
spirits from more than 100 sites in 30 countries. For
Victoria Spirits or Vancouver's Long Table Distillery,
which also produces around 7,000 litres a year, the
devil in those details is having a big impact on the
bottom line. Currently distilleries de"ned as craft
can keep 100 per cent of the proceeds from sales in
their tasting rooms and can sell directly to restaurants
without paying a markup to the
LDB; microdistillers
that don't qualify have to pay a 161 per cent markup.
Charles Tremewen, who opened his award-winning
Long Table Distillery in February 2013, just prior to the
B.C. government's new craft policy, says the new rules
are enough to give him pause. "If we knew then what
we know now, would we rethink our model? Maybe."
Despite attracting some vocal opposition from
industry, John Yap, B.C.'s parliamentary secretary
to the Minister of Justice and Attorney General—and
the man responsible for the province's liquor policy
reform—argues that the new rules have been good
for B.C.'s economy. "We've seen huge increases in the
number of entrepreneurs in the sector of the distillery
business and it's a sector that has a lot of potential, with
new channels to reach customers like selling spirits at
farmers' markets," he says. But the craft designation,
he adds, is here to stay: "My expectation is that there
will be an opportunity to look at a
VQA-like designa-
tion in the future and that will be the opportunity to
consult with the industry. However, the bottom line is
the revenue ‚ow to the province has to stay the same."
78 BCBusiness OctOber 2015