Booze Cruise

Wikipedia

Booze cruise is an English colloquial term for a brief trip from Britain to France or Belgium with the intent of taking advantage of lower prices, and buying personal supplies of (especially) alcohol or tobacco in bulk quantities. Within limits, this is a legally acceptable process and should not be confused with smuggling.

The term is also used in other countries to refer to a pleasure outing on a ship or boat involving a significant amount of drinking, but in the United Kingdom the meaning of a shopping trip for cheaper drinks or tobacco is the understood usage.

The background

Generally, alcohol and tobacco taxes are lower in France than in Britain, and it can make economic sense for people to buy their supplies of wine, beer, spirits and tobacco in bulk in France instead of Britain. There is keen competition between ferry operators and the Channel Tunnel Eurotunnel Shuttle, so day fares to Calais, normally around £60 per vehicle, are sometimes discounted to as little as £10 at off-peak times, while beer often costs little more than half the English shop price. At worst, the savings defray the cost of a day out.

Serving this market has become big business around the major ferry ports of Calais, Boulogne and Dunkirk in France and Ostend in Belgium. Even longer routes from Cherbourg, Normandy and Brittany generate business, boosted by ferries from Ireland where alcohol duties are even higher. The exit route from Calais ferry port passes several large warehouse retailers, English-owned, that serve the market, and some large British supermarket chains have alcohol-only branches selling bottles identical to those in Britain, but at deep discounts. The French have opened an enormous shopping precinct adjacent to the Channel Tunnel (Cité-Europe) that attracts large numbers of British shoppers.

Following large increases in tobacco duty in France, it is now very common for smokers to make a detour to the small town of Adinkerke just read more at » http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Booze+cruise