The party's over

The Spar owner at the centre of a consumer storm last week is in trouble again, this time after state liquor officials raided his bottle store. An officer from the Eastern Cape Department of Agriculture yesterday confiscated a number of illegal liquor products from Gonubie SuperSpar's Tops liquor store.

Called “Party Shots”, the products – which comprise various spirits and mixers in aerosol cans – were specially manufactured for Spar owner, Götz von Westernhagen.

But the manufacturer of Party Shots, Gavin Duffy, described the incident as “a storm in a teacup”.

It's the second time in a week that Von Westernhagen has been in the news for the wrong reasons, after it emerged last week that two of his outlets were selling free promotional Eskom energy-saving light bulbs.

Lafras Venter, chief agricultural quarantine officer in the department's directorate for product inspection services, said the novelty booze items did not meet the labelling conditions of the Liquor Products Act.

It has to be on the label!

The department's action followed a complaint made by the South African Liquor Brand Owners' Association in Stellenbosch.

Venter said in terms of the Act, a liquor product must have the physical address of the manufacturer on its label, as well as the alcohol content of the product. The label must also specify which class or brand of spirit has been bottled.

The Party Shots labels merely indicate that the products contain “whisky and soda; brandy and coke; rum and cola; and peach schnapps”.

The products only reflected a 60/40 mix and alcohol content, but did not specify the actual alcohol percentage.

A telephone number – that of Gonubie SuperSpar – is the only reference to an address on the labels.

After warning the store manager that Party Shots did not comply with the Act, Venter confiscated 193 cans that were on special display.

Gonubie SuperSpar regional manager Nigel Conellan said the products had been bought from Duffy, who offered them to Tops. Conellan said he had not been aware that the labels did not meet the requirements of the Act.

'It's a fun thing'

An invoice from Fountainbleau Wine Emporium, with a Johannesburg Standard Bank account number, was presented by Duffy to Tops. It stated that 2000 containers had been sold to Tops for R25 000 (R12.50 each). Each one sold for R17 in the store.

Duffy yesterday confirmed he owned the Party Shots patent and said he ordered the liquor from Fountainbleau and had it bottled by Carbo Tech, a company in Johannesburg. He said he had been manufacturing the products for six years in Johannesburg.

“But the product was never retailed. It is used for promotional purposes. The SABC, Rand Merchant Bank and the Million Dollar Golf Challenge also bought from me. It's a fun thing.”

Duffy, who has moved to Gonubie, said he was aware Tops sold the product but “didn't think there was a problem with that”.

Conellan said Tops was the first to sell the product. “But we thought it was a good idea for Christmas.”

Source: Daily Dispatch

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