I'm really not sure if that's good or bad. I don't think anyone should drink alcohol, there are many other nice things to do that don't have such a high strain on society. On the other hand, drug prohibition has never worked.
this post was submitted on 24 Jun 2026
40 points (97.6% liked)
Finland
1212 readers
4 users here now
English-language discussions and news relating to Finland and the Finnish culture.
The Finnish community for natives and proficient users of the language ----> !suomi@sopuli.xyz
founded 5 years ago
MODERATORS
There's no need for Alko monopoly, though. The original reason was to strongly limit consumption and sales, but now it's just a store chain that's pretty much comparable to the best alcohol stores in other countries.
Is Alko that bad? Because Systembolaget in Sweden does not even compare to the situation in Germany for example. In Germany, if you want the local or generic pils or weissbier or a budget whisky, you are fine. You want a fancy stout, a nice single malt scotch, you are fucked. You have to order from several different stores in remote cities. In Sweden, you just go to Systemet. So is Alko as bad as the situation in Germany really?
No, Alko is pretty much the same as Systembolaget in terms of quality of service.
It seems to be a telling sign between the reticent Swedes and forthright Finns that the former euphemise their booze outlet as the sinisterly bland “the system concern”, while the latter get straight to the point.
Interesting. In Norway, Vinmonopolet is consistently ranked as one of the most liked brands in the country (like top three, often in first place). The right-wingers have tried to privatize it a couple of times, but people (including their voters) just like it too much 😅
They did slightly extend the opening hours lately, though! And they do offer home delivery.
Finland does a lot right, but this I can’t get my head around
Surely the people are ordering are going to be those bulk purchasing for over consumption or alcoholics?
If by alcoholics you mean normal Finns, yes.
If by overconsumtion you mean
"Well I want to drink s lot on Saturday, so I better drink a lot on Friday too as a shield. And if I'm going to drink on Friday, then I might was well relax with some booze on little Friday (Thursday)", then also yes.
Is this something weird tho? I have been able to get alcohol delivered at home since forever where I live. Either by the delivery service of grocery stores (which wouldn't be same-day delivery but still), and ever since they added grocery store type vendors on uber eats, which has been so a while now
Keeps them off the road and out of society I guess, but surely people are going to drink themselves to death.
They're going to do that anyway, might as well make the road safer and address the alcoholism issue at the same time with appropriate healthcare no ?
Alko is overpriced, has extremely limited selection and most stuff is of very low quality, and it actively kills off all local small manufacturers. We have 2 wineries in my town, neither got into Alko. They only exist to feed government funds and corruption now (top management just happens to get bonuses, not even mentioning total lack of monitoring of bribes from industry), who cares about healthcare of population when people can import alcohol through EU, cook it at home, and until recently just smuggle extremely poisonous stuff from Russia (I know people who did it repeatedly well after the border was "closed").
The more they have loosened the alcohol laws, the less we have drank. Much to THL's and KD's surprise, the children didn't self-combust and won't this time either.