I used to work for Great American Food Stores on the Canadian border in Ogdensburg, NY and would cross over to the Canadian side via the Cornwall Ont. bridge, plus I worked in Alex Bay, a little further south, and would cross over into Kingston, Ont. via the 1000 Islands bridge. I would do price checks on a weekly basis. This was in the '80's and '90's. Prices were fairly consistent in beef, lamb and pork. But, the huge difference was poultry pricing - Canada was 2-5 times higher than American pricing. When in Ogdensburg, NY, several food scientists came from Cornwall, Ont. to purchase 2½ lb. fryers cut up in different ways; I had to order a case per week special for them for 12 weeks; come to find out they were making prototype microwave dinners and they kept exploding in the microwave ovens, so they would go to my store for chickens and Kmart for microwaves! Eventually they perfected them and brought us all a few cases to test out - we had real good lunches for quite a while! They reiterated our chicken prices were ¼ the price of Canada's. I also got a ton of Canadians purchasing turkeys for the holidays too. So, I would look at poultry for purchases in the US, plus also look at import laws too.
