On Selling Wine in Supermarkets
In reading through @buffalogeek’s tweets from yesterday’s County Legislature session, I stumbled upon this:
What is it with this issue? It’s wine and liquor – not guns and crack. Admittedly, I don’t see the point in allowing supermarkets to sell hard liquor. I can see why there’d be a public interest in keeping vodka and Jager under a different roof from the Cap’n Crunch and Wardynski’s. But we sell beer in supermarkets, so why not wine? After all, it has an only incrementally higher alcohol content than beer, and is really a part of dining at home. It fits. Why make people drive to a separate store to pick up a nice bottle of something?
I realize that there is a strong liquor store lobby that vehemently opposes this, and I also realize that the state keeps tight screws on who can and can’t sell and serve alcohol because it’s an opportunity to control and tax. But the argument that permitting the sale of wine (or allowing supermarket pubs, or liquor store chains) is somehow going to be unfair to existing merchants? It’s silly and fiscally counterproductive.
There are many ways for a liquor store to provide better and more personalized service, or more expertise than what you might ultimately find in the wine department at a Wegmans. Plus, if the sale of spirits was kept out of supermarkets, the liquor stores will have retained some exclusivity they so unreasonably treasure.
Loads of people enjoy a nice glass of wine with dinner at home, and it makes perfect sense to let supermarkets sell it. So does permitting membership clubs like Sams and BJs to sell wine. In Massachusetts, the membership clubs sold wine in a separately accessed part of the store – I got decent prices, but no guidance or advice. If I go to Premier, I get both. If Wegmans was allowed to sell wine, I presume that the decisions about what to stock would be left up to expert buyers who would only stock decent stuff. When Trader Joe’s comes to town, we’ll get two buck Chuck. The Trader Joe’s downstate, which don’t sell wine, are sad shells of what a they’re is supposed to be. Less kefir, more wine.
Isn’t the state is going about it all wrong? It gets a cut of every bottle of wine and liquor sold. It would make sense fiscally to maximize the number of outlets selling this. And this goes doubly for the county legislature, which also gets revenue from taxation of beer, wine, and liquor sales. This should be a no-brainer, and the interests of reducing a bad deficit should trump political contributions and lobbying from liquor store interests.
A 15-0 vote opposing the sale of wine in supermarkets is stupid. Give the choice to consumers, not to liquor store lobbyists and puritans.
Just look at the number of mom and pop corner stores that went out of business when they allowed super markets to sell food
It’s absolutely retarded.
Virginia has some retarded rules of its own, but the grocery stores still sell wine. And you know what, THERE ARE STILL WINE STORES!
You go to Giant if you want some crappy $5 bottle of crap. You go to Total Wine if you want to talk to someone who has a clue and find something unique. They also have the cheapies, but what the hell.
I don’t see the point in keeping hard liquor out of super markets. It’s not as if kids have any trouble getting their liquor anyway.
Just to add to the silliness, I’m pretty sure that a place like Premier isn’t allowed to sell hard cider. You have to go to the grocery store for that.
I’m pro-regulation. I believe that governments create and maintain markets, and that governments are obligated to intervene in those markets in order to ensure safe practices, to protect consumers from fraud, and to pursue any aspect of the public interest. I think that the government should intervene more strongly into sectors that directly affect the infrastructure.
But the rules regarding liquor sales are blatantly political. Liquor stores aren’t anyone’s idea of infrastructure, and there’s no evidence that supermarkets can’t obey the same laws that liquor stores do. There are already laws governing who can buy liquor and where you can use it. So why should the government determine what kind of retail firm can legally sell a legal product? The supermarkets aren’t asking for exemption from ID checks, for example. The same rules would apply to liquor stores and supermarkets, and it would probably end up being better for consumers.
When are you going to blog about leagalizing marijuanna?
Shorter Mark: People are stupid and shouldn’t be allowed to make their own decisions. It doesn’t matter if that restricts markets and drives up the cost for everyone. But, he likes his liquor and is willing to make an exception, kind of.
California sells even hard liquor in grocery stores, and that state’s not overrun with children buying Jack Daniels when they should be buying Apple Jacks…let grocery stores sell everything.
There’s no good reason not to
In states where I’ve lived that allow the sales of wine in grocery stores, there’s still plenty of liquor stores. However, they tend to be much larger than a typical Buffalo corner store-like liquor store (Premier and Frontier really aren’t the norm; little places like Danahy Liquors, Williamsville Liquors, and so on are more the norm in WNY). Liquor stores outside of New York tend to have a deeper selection than the supermarkets, and many also sell a very deep selection of beer.
I’ve heard the lack of in-store wine sales is one reason why Whole Foods, Trader Joe’s, and World Market won’t open locations in Buffalo and Upstate New York. Without wine, the numbers may work for NYC-area stores, but not Buffalo or Rochester.
What I worry about is whether wine sales will extend to Buffalo’s so-called “delis”. Forty-dogs, tiny baggies, blunts *and* MD 20/20 … not a good combination.
Shorter Mike: I have an inability to realize different issues in society require different approaches.
It’s a hell of a lot safer than booze.
Even the most liberated libertarians agree that one legitimate role of government is to “protect consumers from fraud.” You seem to have slipped from glibertarianism to anarchist somewhere along the line.
In Michigan, every grocery store sells wine and hard liquor yet we have substaintially more ‘party stores’ that only sell wine, beer and liquor than anything comparable in Buffalo. If I want to pick up a bottle of Tanqueray, I’ll end up buying it at the super market. They care mostly name brand stuff and it’s fairly cheap. If I’m looking to try something new, I’ll go to a party store and be able to pick from 20 different brands of gin I’ve never heard of. If anything, letting grocery stores sell booze will help the smaller stores by forcing them to have a better, more diverse product they can charge more for. The party stores tend to have beer selections that put grocery stores to shame as well. At Meijer, it’s Bud. Miller and every other mass produced American beer with a few imports in 6s packs. At a smaller specialty beer store near my house, I can get just about any beer I could ever think of (including Genny Cream Ale which despite access to the classy stuff, is still all I drink.)
If New York State was smart about this, they’d be collecting money from Wegmans for a liquor licence and knocking a few bucks off the cost of it for supermarkets who stock a high percentage of New York State produced wines.
Green Death? You can’t possibly be serious?
I actually still have a receipt from the 90s when I was in Cleveland one morning. I bought a bottle of Jack, packs of firecrackers, and a pair of nunchuks from a convenience store at 10:03 am.
Firecrackers, nunchuks and Jack Daniels. A recipe for…what? Too funny.
Fraud is a criminal and civil law violation. Libertarians understand that we have courts of law to address fraud, we don’t need ever-expanding bureaucracies that encroach on our daily lives.
Freeing up the sale of wine with a dash of protectionism, that’s precious.
I’ve seen Detroit party stores. They’re the equivalent of Buffalo’s “delis”, or to use the residents’ vernacular, “Arab stores”. A deli on East Ferry isn’t going to be carrying a 1945 Mouton Rothschild Pauillac Bordeaux, much less a 2008 Yellow Tail Shiraz. They’re going to be stocking a lovely vintage last Monday Night Train Express, or a delightful vintage this morning Thunderbird.
I support wine sales in supermarkets, but what about other outlets?
And if you sold it in grocery stores, you could pick up your doritos and little debbie snacks at the same time!