Manitoba Liquor Mart - The Old Days

If you have to ask what wine goes with fish, you are too young to be in here, son.

The Manitoba Liquor Control Commission didn't mess around. Prohibition might have ended but it didn't mean that Manitoba government had to like it. You could still be a dry town if you wanted.

If you did sale alcohol, it had to be a government store. And no alcohol where you could paw at it. You had to write your order down, show your ID where it was recorded and then you could buy. One of the white shirt, tie and bow-tie guys would get your order. And no funny business. Lots of veterans worked stores. They dealt with Hitler or Japanese or Koreans in the war and could certainly deal with you.

The regulations on alcohol were stringent and in no way was the retail experience supposed to be nice. Beer was sold by hotel vendours but there too, you didn't get past the front counter.

In light of alcohol thefts, lots of ideas are being bandied about. The Crown is being hostile to the media, the public and saying they are working on it or blaming society's ills. The police are telling the public to do nothing.

It is true that retail thefts are happening everywhere but we haven't heard it happening in cannabis and beer stores. For the beer stores, it is probably because steeling cans or bottles is heavy work and that $60 theft is likely to get your caught as you lug it down Portage Avenue. For cannabis, it is because is sold the way liquor was sold decades ago! You need ID and it is behind the counter, Good luck.

Liquor execs might get angry but they should fear a public that says: Toss it. What they might get is demands for online sales and delivery (which they'll get regardless) , privatization and end of the retail experience they get now.

No one likes watching criminal behaviour take place in front of them every day.