The owners of a downtown café in Charlottetown are challenging the province's decision not to let them serve liquor on their patio.
'They want a panini and they darn well want a glass of wine with it!'- Susan Roggeveen
Just Us Girls is a restaurant and retail shop on Queen Street, with that dual identity causing problems for the provincial liquor commission. The indoor café has a licensed bar, but servers can't carry drinks onto the patio.
Liquor control officials say drinks can't cross the retail area.
For potential customers, the distinction is confusing. Just around the corner on Victoria Row, the street is closed to traffic specifically so that bars can freely open patios where customers can drink all they like.
"We don't have high liquor sales," Susan Roggeveen, co-owner of Just Us Girls, told CBC News Thursday.
"It's the retired ladies who come in, and they want a panini and they darn well want a glass of wine with it! You've got to break the news to them, well, you can't have that."
'They just couldn't understand'
The café owners say the situation is discouraging to business owners who are trying to liven up the downtown.
"Last weekend with the Jazz Festival, Victoria Row — it was packed," said Roggeveen.
"We are the nearest overflow, the nearest patio to Victoria Row. And people were coming over, wanting to sit outside and listen to the beautiful music, and they just couldn't understand how they could not. They could go around the corner and have a beer on the patio there but they couldn't sit on this patio and have a beer and listen to the music and have a bite to eat."
Jaimie Grist, the chef at Just Us Girls, said since early June she has counted 184 customers who have walked away when they heard they couldn't get a drink on the patio.
The patio has some fencing. The owners plan to add more fencing and put a liquor cart outside. They hope that will satisfy the rules.
The liquor control board wouldn't comment on the situation. It will review the establishment's licence at the end of the month.
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