The Crown Royal bottling facility in Amherstburg will close February 28.
Ontario Premier Doug Ford says he will follow through on a threat to pull Crown Royal whisky products from LCBO shelves when that happens, but will not remove all products the parent company Diageo makes which includes Johnnie Walker, Guinness, Smirnoff, Baileys, Captain Morgan, and Tanqueray.
Diageo made the closure announcement in August saying it's shifting some bottling volume to the United States.
Unifor Local 200 initially represented 200 members but that has been reduced to 150 as workers have left the facility to take jobs elsewhere.
Union President John D'Agnolo said he asked Ford to remove all Diageo products from the LCBO, one at a time, to put pressure on the company.
"Take Baileys off the shelf at Christmas I told him. It's their number one selling product during Christmas holidays. That would be more impactful and just take another brand like Captain Morgan rum and so on, but, he just didn't think it was the right thing to do," he said.
D'Agnolo said he would've liked Ford to remove Crown Royal from the LCBO a lot earlier.
"Personally I asked the premier myself to take it off earlier, but, he was adamant that he was going to do it after. He was hoping that the company would change their mindset," said D'Agnolo.
He added that he was hoping Manitoba and Quebec would've shown support for Ontario.
"I know it's a team Canada approach but wouldn't it be a team Canada approach if we all got together and said this is nonsense, and you shouldn't be leaving Canada, but, unfortunately that wasn't the case," he said.
Diageo said in the fall that its Crown Royal products will continue to be mashed, distilled and aged at its Canadian facilities in Manitoba and Quebec but premier Ford is predicting those plants will close with production moved to Alabama.