OTTAWA — Ontario, Canada’s most populous province, said on Thursday that it would partly open its beer retailing system, which is dominated by three of the world’s largest breweries.

“The days of the monopoly are done,” Kathleen Wynne, premier of the province, said at a news conference. “This is the biggest shake-up to the sale of beer in Ontario since we repealed prohibition.”

For the last 88 years, Ontario’s $3 billion retail beer market has been dominated by Brewers Retail, which is owned by Anheuser-Busch InBev, Molson Coors and Sapporo Brewery. Smaller breweries have said that Brewers Retail favors its brands and excludes the competition. The chain’s 466 shops, under the Beer Store brand, are often spartan and keep beer out of sight in warehouses, creating an experience for consumers that has been compared to shopping in the old Soviet Union.

Stocking the Beer Store, which controls beer sales in Ontario.Ontario’s Beer Bottleneck Is Under Siege by Brewers and BuyersMARCH 6, 2015
The only other beer retailers in the province, government-owned liquor stores, have been barred through an agreement with Brewers Retailer from selling packages with more than six bottles or cans.

The changes from Ms. Wynne’s government do not go as far as other provinces have, particularly neighboring Quebec where beer is widely available in corner stores and supermarkets as well as in government liquor stores. Instead, Ontario will allow about a third of its 1,500 largest supermarkets to sell beer by the end of the year. They will, however, not be permitted to offer anything larger than six-packs.

Some government liquor stores will start carrying larger package sizes and offering online sales with delivery.

In a statement, Brewers Retail said it would spend 100 million Canadian dollars, or $80 million, to improve its shops. Its owners have agreed to give small breweries more shelf space and marketing opportunities in the stores.

While details of those improvements were unclear and they fall short of what small breweries had requested, the changes drew praise from Cam Heaps, the chairman of Ontario Craft Brewers, a trade group, and co-founder of Steam Whistle Brewing in Toronto.

But he added, “The Beer Store does have an image problem with craft brewers, which it is going to have to work on.”

Source | NyTimes.com.