Sweden and alcohol

I only found out after I had moved to Sweden that the state controls the sale of alcohol in “System Bolaget” stores, they are actually very well stocked have decent opening hours and a good selection so it is not all that bad and  there are pubs and hotels and restaurants also where alcohol is served but absolutely no carry outs like back in Ireland where a 6-pack at closing time is very popular or was a few years ago anyway.
The System Bolaget is a very popular destination and is always thronged full of people on a Friday afternoon, getting the binge quantity of booze in for the weekend, you’d swear that it was New Years Eve every Friday, unless you have witnessed New Years Eve in the “Bolaget” then it’s like the end of the world. You never see an idle staff member in the Bolaget on a Friday and not many people have less than 3 or 4 bottles, it could be Swedish practicality that one person is buying for many, (and possibly many underage drinkers) unless the gangs of drunken youths are getting pissed on wine gums and low alcohol beer from the super market, they are more than likely getting stuff bought out for them. In the logical manner here they only drink at the weekend, really polluted drunk, then stay sober all week.

Then you have hooch, moonshine or what they call here “Hembrand” or distilled at home, leaves several people blind and dead every year so the technique is not what you would call reliable, but the very expensive spirit price drives production and casualties underground.

Last and by no means least you have private importation. The Swedish drive to Denmark and Germany to avail of the cheap booze there, they have much lower tax in Germany so it is popular to fill up the Volvo Estate with beer wine and spirits, and drive back to Sweden. The customs service is being reduced all the time so nowadays you don’t even have to worry too much about being over the limit, the only thing that you will be done for is overlaoding your vehicle, the cops will stop you if you have more weight in the car than it was designed for, to hell with the booze for a lifetime in the car, the back axle will crack before the customs will get involved. The big irony is that Swedish breweries export vast quantities of beer to Germany in big trucks, to be driven back into Sweden in a fleet of Volvos, so the citizens feel they are getting a good deal, the state feels that it is protecting the citizens from alcohol by controlling the sale and keeping the taxes high, even though the own the company that sells the spirits and they own the company that makes Absolut Vodka , and they have no way of controlling the quantity of booze being privately imported. They also recently lost a case to stop people from importing on the net. If they reduced the tax a bit it would mean that they would make more money from the increased sales volume, but then the anti-alcohol lobby would be bleating about increased consumption, the statistics show an increase as it is, if you counted all the black market alcohol, private imports etc. the stats would be horrible, better to keep the status quo. Never mind about all the waste of petrol and the effect on the environment with all the Volvos shunting back and forth to Germany.

So much for environmentally friendly and logical Sweden.