Deb Anderson can't remember the last time she bought a product from the United States.
Like many Canadians, the 65 year old from Prospect, N.S., said she's been alarmed by U.S. President Donald Trump's repeated threats against Canada — and she's been boycotting American goods in protest.
So when she read on Friday that Canada was prepared to lift a ban on American alcohol sales as part of its trade negotiations with the Trump administration, Anderson says she felt disappointed.
"But just because it goes back on the shelves doesn't mean that sales are going to go back to where they were. The damage has been done," she told CBC in an interview.
Anderson says the "constant badgering and unfair negotiation practices" from the U.S. have "really give us a bad taste for all things American."
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Anderson doesn't appear to be alone in her feelings: Sixty-nine per cent of Canadians said they weren't likely to buy American alcohol if it goes back on store shelves, according to a Nanos Research poll published last month.
Support for a continued boycott of U.S. alcohol was highest in British Columbia, where 80.9 per cent of respondents said they were unlikely or somewhat unlikely to buy U.S. booze again if it's made available.
That was followed by 74.7 per cent of people in Ontario and 73.9 per cent of Quebecers who said the same, the poll found.
Industry sources with knowledge of Canada-U.S. trade negotiations told CBC News that the Canadian government was prepared to lift bans on alcohol sales as it negotiates possible concessions in exchange for U.S. tariff relief.
Trump has threatened to impose 50 per cent tariffs on some Canadian goods on Aug. 19 if Canada fails to lift some retaliatory trade measures against the U.S., including the alcohol bans.
Those bans date back to early last year, when several provinces removed U.S. alcohol from the shelves at their respective liquor boards in response to Trump slapping a 25-per-cent tariff on Canadian goods.
Ivan Gedz, who owns the bar Union Local 613 in Ottawa, says his stockpile of American booze ran out two months after U.S. supplies were taken off the shelves at the Liquor Control Board of Ontario (LCBO) last year.
But Gedz says customers at the bar, which had previously offered a wide range of American spirits, didn't bat an eye at not having access to bourbon and other alcohol made south of the border.