When was Brewers Retail Inc founded?
The Beer Store
Brewers Retail Inc., doing business as The Beer Store, is a Canadian privately owned chain of retail outlets selling beer and other malt beverages in the province of Ontario, Canada. Founded in 1927, it was owned at its inception by a consortium of Ontario-based brewers. It currently operates as a unique open retail and wholesale system primarily owned by 3 large multinational brewing companies. It is also partially owned (under 0.02%) by 30 Ontario-based brewers. Under the ownership model, all qualified brewers are free to list their products without discrimination and to set their own selling prices, subject to LCBO price approval that must comply with legislated minimum and uniform pricing requirements.
L. S. Ayres
As urban populations shifted outward to suburban areas, Ayres moved closer to its customers by establishing branch stores in Indianapolis and Lafayette, Indiana. In 1959 Ayres also opened a large warehouse facility and service center on Hillside Avenue in Indianapolis. In 1965 a new branch store opened in the Greenwood Shopping Center, ten miles south of the Indianapolis flagship store. In 1966 Ayres opened a new branch store at Glenbrook Square in Fort Wayne, Indiana. In addition to building new branch stores in Indiana, Ayres acquired a retail subsidiary, The John Bressmer Company in 1958, located in Springfield, Illinois, and created Ayr-Way, a chain of self-service discount stores. In 1969 Ayres expanded into Louisville, Kentucky, with the acquisition of Kaufman-Straus Company, a retail division of City Stores Corporation. The declining downtown Louisville store was not profitable and Ayres closed it within two years of its purchase. In 1973 Ayres installed an Ayr-Way discount store in the downtown Louisville location, but it also failed and closed in 1975. Two suburban Louisville locations were later merged into Ayres's Indianapolis operations. The City Stores deal also included the acquisition of Wolf and Dessauer (W&D), a leading department store in downtown Fort Wayne, Indiana. In the late 1960s Ayres also entered the field of specialty retailing with the establishment of the Sycamore Shops and Cygnet Shops to cater to young adults.