Local businesses selling alcohol face a unique challenge. Glass bottles are becoming harder to come by, and the scarcity is reducing their profits. Read on to know more about why Guelph alcohol businesses face bottle shortages and what can be done about it.
Talking about
the situation, Tariq Ahmed, founder of Revel
Cider, said, "You can find glass bottles right now, but they're twice
the price, and that's the real issue." As of now, Revel Cider is procuring
glass bottles from Germany. They were lucky enough to negotiate for them a year
in advance. Still, they are paying more as shipping costs and commercial space
rent have risen in price.
Ahmed said, "It's
not only glass, it's aluminum cans, it's cardboard, it's affected the price of
everything."
The co-founder
of Dixon's Distilled Spirits, JD Dixon, stated that glass bottles are only one
part of the problem due to ongoing supply chain disruptions. Even labels, caps,
seals, and boxes are seeing delivery delays. All of this impacts production.
Dixon said, "We
didn't just start feeling it, this definitely started that way last year, but
we're now feeling those backlogs, and you have to be willing to adjust."
Dixon also
mentioned that he realized there could be future issues with the supply chain
early on in the pandemic and started to order larger quantities of glass
bottles in advance. As the costs associated with shipping and manufacturing
have risen, Dixon's had to increase prices. He said, "It's a domino effect
... it's also all the components along the way because their shipping costs
have doubled and tripled. So they're passing all those things along, and by the
time it gets to me, well, that's why it's a 53 to 56 percent in the raw
material before the liquid even goes in."
At the time of
writing this article, Dixon's had about 15,600 bottles and 26 skids of product
that were ready to go for the upcoming Victoria Day weekend. Another truck will
also be coming at the end of June. Dixon stated, "That's where other
distilleries or breweries are going to find themselves in trouble. If they're
not thinking about July, August, or September right now, they're going to be in
trouble."
New Hope
As international
manufacturers of these products are closing down, new North American
manufacturers are coming up. Commenting on that, Dixon said, "I think
that's a good thing, people see opportunity. All of a sudden, I'm getting calls
now like, 'Hey, we're making bottles in Windsor,' and 'We're making bottles in
Montreal,' so we're like, okay, that's great!' It comes with a little bit of an
extra cost, but the security or safety is that you know you can get your
bottles because your bottles are only a few hours away."
Return Your Empties
Customers can
help the companies dealing with the shortage issues by returning their empty
bottles so that the manufacturers can reuse them and get them back into the
system. Or you can recycle them too. Read more here.
Sources:
https://www.guelphtoday.com/membership/features/glass-bottle-shortage-not-the-only-reason-guelph-alcohol-businesses-are-raising-prices-5392754
https://kitchener.ctvnews.ca/guelph-distillery-frustrated-with-glass-bottle-shortage-1.5910002
https://kitchener.ctvnews.ca/guelph-distillery-frustrated-with-glass-bottle-shortage-1.5910002