Three new Peace Region liquor manufacturers in the works

Nov 10, 2017 | 3:48 PM

There could soon be a bigger variety of local brew to choose from within the Peace Region.

Right now, there are five manufacturers producing liquor in the area, but there are more in the process of getting their bottles to the shelves.

“Throughout the province of Alberta, we currently have 29 active applications going through the process. We also have, in the Peace Country, three new applicants going through the process. These are businesses that have been set up and are actively going through the licensing process,” said Jody Korchinski, Vice-President of Liquor Services with the Alberta Liquor and Gaming Commision.

If everything falls into place, there will be a total of eight liquor producers in the area within the next two years.

In the last four years, there has been a jump from 31 manufacturers to 100 in the province. Korschinski is attributing the jump to a change in requirements.

“The AGLC did a consultation back in 2012. We were asking the manufacturing sector, what can we do in order to make it more appealing for manufacturers to set up business in Alberta? One of the key things manufacturers told us was the minimum production requirements that we had in place were very prohibitive for manufacturers to set up shop.”

The V.P. explains that producers had to be able to produce a certain amount in order to run their business and it varied in each category. Before the AGLC removed that stipulation in 2013, a beer producer had to be able to make 500,000 litres per year.

The 100th Class E liquor producer’s license was given to Dunvegan Brewing from Rycroft which rounded out the five Peace Country producers.

by Justine Kelsie