For the second time in just over six months, the Société des alcools du Québec (SAQ) is announcing a price increase, this time by 3.7%, on average, on 2,550 products.
The increase will come into effect next Sunday, May 22, for the vast majority of products, but on July 17 for 80 of them.
Among the specialty products, mainly offered in the Espace Cellier, 1328 will suffer a price increase of 3.3% and the prices of 157 others will decrease by 2.6% next Sunday.
The SAQ reports that the prices of 182 other products will be reduced, on average by 2.1%, and that those of 606 will remain stable.
At the beginning of last November, the SAQ announced that it would carry out an average price increase of 1.66% on 1,332 products, most of them in the following days, although the prices of around 50 of them were only noted at the end of last January.
In a statement released on Monday, the state-owned company explained that amid global supply chain disruption, exceptionally high shipping costs and increased supplier production costs, the new price adjustment becomes necessary.
The SAQ specifies that suppliers’ production costs are linked to shortages of bottles, caps and labels, as well as a shortage of labour.
In addition, the unfavorable weather conditions of 2021 are still affecting the supply of products for certain wine regions, according to the SAQ, with less availability of certain products and demand that remains strong. Three French regions are particularly affected, Beaujolais, Burgundy and Loire.
Similar arguments were used by the SAQ last November to justify the price increase at the time.
The Crown corporation also recalls that on April 1, the Government of Canada increased the annual excise duty rates on alcoholic beverages. For wine, a 2.4% increase was applied, which is another factor that has had an impact on the price adjustment.