Part 2/14:
The announcement was sudden and brutal: production would cease in Amherstburg by February of the following year, with operations moving to the United States—specifically Illinois and Quebec, where costs are lower and operational ease is greater. The decision was framed by Diagio, Crown Royal’s parent company, as a move to “streamline the supply chain” — a corporate euphemism masking the reality of a business driven primarily by economic incentives rather than market demand. The factory, thriving and profitable, was shuttered not because of declining whiskey sales but because Canada’s economic landscape has grown increasingly hostile to manufacturing.