Canadian Breweries History: Labatt Brewing Company
Since its founding in 1847, the Labatt Brewing Company has become an
internationally renowned brewer. A proud brewer of 60 quality beers,
Labatt employs 3,800 Canadians and operates eight breweries from coast to
coast as of 2003. Labatt’s first brewery produced about a thousand
bottles of beer a year. Today, Labatt Brewing Company is part of
Belgium-based Interbrew S.A., one of the largest brewing groups in the
world with more than 180 fine beers available in over 110 countries
worldwide.
Labatt has deep roots in Canada stemming from its founder John
Kinder Labatt. In 1847, a little more than a decade after arriving in
London, Ontario from Ireland, John Labatt purchased London’s Simcoe Street
brewery in partnership with Samuel Eccles and by 1853 had become the
brewery’s sole proprietor. The brewery was later renamed John Labatt’s
Brewery.
Prohibition in Canada began in 1915, when public bars were
banned in Saskatchewan. A year later, prohibition was instituted in
Ontario, affecting all 64 breweries in the province. While some
provinces totally banned alcohol manufacture, distribution and sales,
many allowed for the production of beer for export to the U.S.
Labatt survived by producing full strength beer for export south of
the border and by introducing two ³temperance ales,” (brews with less
than two per cent alcohol) for sale in Ontario. When Prohibition was
repealed in Ontario in 1926, just 15 breweries remained and only
Labatt retained its original management. This resulted in a strengthened
industry position.
With the issuance of 900,000 shares in 1945, Labatt became a
publicly traded company, creating new opportunities for raising capital.
Labatt¹s 1946 purchase of the Copland Brewery in Toronto, its first
outside London, spawned the beginning of a brewing empire and marked
the company¹s first step towards becoming a national brewer.
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