The U.S. spirits industry is reporting a big drop in sales in Canada after multiple provinces pulled liquor off shelves and Canadians turned to buying more goods at home in response to the trade war.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A joint press release by Spirits Canada and the Distilled Spirits Council of the United States shows that from March 5 until April 30, sales of U.S. spirits in Canada fell by 66.3 per cent compared with the same period last year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Multiple provinces pulled American alcohol off the shelves on March 5 in response to U.S. President Donald Trump\u2019s tariffs<\/strong><\/a> and his talk of annexing Canada.<\/p>\n\n\n\n From March 5 until the end of April, Canadian spirits sales also declined, but at a lower rate of 6.3 per cent. Other imported spirits declined by 8.2 per cent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The two groups said total spirits sales in Canada dropped 12.3 per cent during the same period.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe North American spirits sector is highly interconnected, and the immediate and continued removal of all U.S. spirits products from Canadian shelves is deeply problematic for spirits producers on both sides of the border,\u201d said Cal Bricker, president and CEO of Spirits Canada.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201c<\/em>The current disruption demonstrates the critical importance of maintaining open, reciprocal trade relationships that benefit consumers, businesses and government revenues in both nations.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Some American makers criticized the decision by the provinces to pull U.S. liquor off shelves at the time, with Jack Daniel\u2019s maker Brown Forman\u2019s CEO Lawson Whiting calling the move \u201cworse than a tariff.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI mean, that\u2019s worse than a tariff, because it\u2019s literally taking your sales away, (and) completely removing our products from the shelves,\u201d he said on a post-earnings call.<\/p>\n\n\n\n According to Spirits Canada and the Distilled Spirits Council, total spirits fell sharply by 20 per cent year over year in March.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Canadian spirits sales increased 3.6 per cent in April, with other imported spirits up 3.7 per cent, but the gains didn\u2019t compensate for the losses from U.S. removal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Chris Swonger, president and CEO of the Distilled Spirits Council, said in the joint release that U.S. liquor should be back on Canadian shelves and that the move is \u201cneedlessly reducing revenues for the provinces and hurting Canadian consumers and hospitality businesses.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Months into the trade war, Canadians seem to show no signs of letting up on avoiding U.S. goods and travel \u2014 in fact, numbers have grown.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Ipsos polling conducted exclusively for Global News and released in time for Canada Day showed that 72 per cent of Canadians<\/strong><\/a> are avoiding U.S.-made goods.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The polling also showed that 77 per cent of respondents think less of the U.S. as a country because of Trump\u2019s attacks on Canada\u2019s economy and sovereignty.<\/p>\n\n\n\n‘Mean and nasty’ \u2014 or doubling down?<\/strong><\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n