Hard to find

Diageo Canada

Crown Royal Northern Harvest Rye, the 2016 World Whisky of the Year, has been a hot commodity since it won the title last month.

Waterloo Region Record

By Kevin Swayze 

WATERLOO REGION — After all his trouble trying to find a bottle of the coveted Crown Royal Northern Harvest Rye, Brennan Connolly wasn't wowed when he tasted it.

The Kitchener man chased down a bottle on Nov. 21, the day after the 90-proof drink was named whisky of the year. He shared a couple of glasses with a buddy while watching a hockey game that night.

"It's pretty good. It's been so hyped up. We expected to fall off our chairs, and didn't," he said.

"This is so personal. Wine is like that … it's such an individual thing. I'm not sure it's something I'd go out and get again."

After seeing the story of the rye blow up on social media on Nov. 20, he decided to look in his neighbourhood LCBO at the Stanley Park Mall. The shelf was empty.

"At the time, I didn't realize it would be that hard to find."

So he called the Fairway Road store. Nope. Victoria Street: Zilch. Homer Watson: Nothing.

"I don't know why we ended up deciding it was so necessary that night," Connolly said.

Staff at the Homer Watson store looked up stock at lcbo.com and reported two bottles at the Northfield store in Waterloo and nine at the King Street store in Cambridge. There were four left when he got to the Preston-area store. He bought one, but wondered later why he didn't buy two.

There weren't any bottles at any LCBO outlet in Waterloo Region on Sunday. As of noon, there were 67 bottles of the "World Whisky of the Year" on the shelves of three Toronto-area stores. None anywhere else.

More will be delivered this week, said Christine Bujold, LCBO spokesperson. Sales are first come, first served: no bottles will be put on hold.

In Waterloo Region, store staff are telling eager customers the coveted rye is on order, and a case or two may or may not be on the next delivery truck.

The 750 millilitre bottles sell for $32 at the LCBO.

Bottles were posted Sunday for sale on eBay, Craigslist and Kijiji by Ontario residents. Asking prices start at $50 and go as high as $100.

Reselling alcohol is illegal bootlegging, Bujold said.

Sales of Northern Harvest were up 400 per cent last week at the LCBO. The Ontario liquor board had already purchased the largest allocation for any Canadian province before whisky connoisseur Jim Murray praised it.

Local LCBO store managers are mum about exactly when new deliveries might arrive, as eager customers nose around to buy a bottle — or a case.

"We had three cases come in on Tuesday: they're all gone," said Cecilia Hisey, a supervisor at the Wellesley Village Market, which has an LCBO outlet inside the store.

Liquor is shipped there via the New Hamburg LCBO store, which doesn't have any more, either.

"They had 120 bottles and they all sold within two hours. People were lining up in the parking lot waiting on Tuesday morning," Hisey said.

In the 14 years she's worked at the Wellesley store, Hisey remembers only one time where there was so much public demand for new booze.

"When Bud Light Lime came in, it sold quickly as well," she said.

kswayze@therecord.com