PEILCC Annual Report 2021

The Wine category continued to display strong performance again in 2020-2021 selling a total of 1,680,117 litres, a decrease of 118,884 litres from the previous year. An increase of 693,149 in Refreshments - Ready To Drink (RTD) shows it’s continued rise in popularity. New offerings continued to drive growth in both sales and volume in this category. The availability of one time offerings throughout the year has also been popular with customers. The PEILCC continues to expand the Vines concept to include many PEILCC retail outlets displaying these products as a portion of each location’s shelf set including themes such as Island Style which helped to promote local food and drink pairings with recipes. Merchandising across the corporate retail network permitted products to be featured in a like fashion and provides consistency across all locations. Local producers continue to benefit from exposure of having their products featured on Buy Local displays as well as on the shelves with products of their respective category. The Festival of Wines was not able to take place as the result of restrictions imposed by the COVID-19 pandemic. The PEILCC looks forward to this annual event taking place again in 2022, including the pop-up retail boutique featuring the wines of the festival. Unfortunately, other similar events were also cancelled due to pandemic restrictions including the PEI Spirit Festival and the PEI Beer Festival. A number of vendor supported themed campaigns ran throughout the course of the year A number of PEILCC retail employees have taken advanced training in the WSET program, providing them with an additional level of expertise which is beneficial when helping customers with product options. This training combined with other initiatives led by the Commission’s Category Managers, have contributed to the development of all categories and the growth of overall sales.

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PEILCC 2020-2021 Annual Report