Grand Manan store facing loss of N.B. Liquor franchise among its top performers last year
CBC
N.B. Liquor's agency store on Grand Manan has posted a sales increase for the 10th year in a row, new figures confirm. That's reigniting questions about a decision the Crown corporation has made to move what has been one of its most successful franchises to a new location.
"We had a good year, like a really good year," said Faye Guptill, owner of the Castalia Convenience outlet.
"Everything was doing fine. Why move it?"
Faye and her husband Roger have had the retail franchise to sell alcohol on Grand Manan at their country store on Route 776 since N.B. Liquor closed its own corporate outlet on the island in late 2011.
According to newly released figures in N.B. Liquor's annual report, retail sales on Grand Manan reached a new record of $2.245 million for the fiscal year that ended on April 3, 2022.
That's an increase of 3.4 per cent over the previous year and put the store among N.B. Liquor's top franchise performers. Overall sales at N.B. Liquor were up 2.8 per cent, according to its annual report, but most of its individual agency stores in New Brunswick, 65 of 88, suffered sales declines during the year.
Agency stores keep as little as seven per cent commission on what they sell for N.B. Liquor but the franchises are prized for the traffic they generate.
The Guptills say they worked hard to build their business, adding extra shelf space and coolers over the years.
N.B. Liquor's own records appear to confirm that and show the Grand Manan outlet has been among its top sales growth leaders for the last decade.
Since its first full year as a designated N.B. Liquor retailer in the 2013 fiscal year, figures show alcohol sales at Castalia Convenience are up 70.6 per cent. That's more than double the 34 per cent increase of N.B. Liquor's total corporate-wide sales from all sources over the same period.
Still the Guptills were informed in August that N.B. Liquor will be moving the Grand Manan franchise about two kilometres down the road to the local Loblaw grocery store and Irving Oil outlet as of January
The Guptills were nearing the end of their contract period this year and had been expecting to be offered a renewal but a decision was made by N.B. Liquor to put the franchise out to tender. Faye Guptill said an N.B. Liquor representative told her she did well on the 100 point scoring system employed to evaluate bids received but not quite as well as the nearby Loblaw franchise.
Guptill said she is still waiting to be given details about that scoring to decide if there is room to fight the decision.
"I haven't got my score back yet. I'm going to have to go through it and see," said Guptill. "They said I scored really high and so I need to see where I went wrong. But I mean, there's only so much I can do."
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