Liquor laws. Whats up with that?

[Decimotox]

I live in Missouri and you can buy anything in any store, comer convenience store, walmart, any grocery store, any day any time, wine, beer, liqueur

Loved it when I was down there. Went to college outside of St. Louis. We even bought liquor at like 1 am in Illinois (grocery store). I like that part of the country lol.

Now that I live in MN, I have to make sure I'm set for football Sundays by Saturday. Only once have I had to go to a grocery store to buy some 3.2% beer on a Sunday, since that's all you can get on Sundays.

 

[pdxal]

When I lived in East Texas, Jasper to be exact, about 20 years ago it was a dry county. There were liquor stores feet from the county line on all roads out of the county selling to everyone from the "dry" county. They allowed alcohol in private clubs, so restaurants would allow you to join their "club" for a couple of bucks/year and you could have a beer with your meal(s).
Pennsylvania was wacky as previously mentioned.
Thankfully I live in Oregon where the weirdest law is that liquor is only sold in state-owned liquor stores or about a half dozen private stores selling as an experiment statewide.

 

[ImNoExpert]

I blame the constitution for the discrepancies.

 

[btbnl]

Until it all got straightened out a few years back, the UK Sunday trading laws were piecemeal to the point that you could buy carpet by the meter but not by the yard, and pornography but not the bible.

 

[BentBrewer]

CA: Free for all. yay!

Couple of gotchas, for breweries at least:
(Disclaimer: This is from a lecture over a year ago, so I might be fuzzy on exact details.)

Breweries can't donate product. They can sell at a loss, but no free beer.

Breweries cannot deliver product between 7PM Saturday to 9AM Monday. Product can still be picked up at the brewery however. :smack:

On a Type23 license (brewery only, no food served) No outside alcohol allowed. Meaning I can't even allow someone to bring me a bottle of homebrew to taste without breaking the law. (And of course, no bottles of bourbon in the desk drawer.)

 

[petemoss]

Alabama: You can buy beer and wine pretty much everywhere except only after Noon on Sundays. Liquor has to be bought from a liquor store.

There are some dry counties left I believe where everything is off limits. I remember as a kid, we lived in Walker county for a while and my folks would have to make runs to the county line. Eventually, they made Jasper (the main city in Walker County) wet, so folks didn't have to do that any longer. Seems odd having a dry county with a wet city inside of it.

 

[Phunhog]

Couple of gotchas, for breweries at least:
(Disclaimer: This is from a lecture over a year ago, so I might be fuzzy on exact details.)

Breweries can't donate product. They can sell at a loss, but no free beer.

Breweries cannot deliver product between 7PM Saturday to 9AM Monday. Product can still be picked up at the brewery however. :smack:

On a Type23 license (brewery only, no food served) No outside alcohol allowed. Meaning I can't even allow someone to bring me a bottle of homebrew to taste without breaking the law. (And of course, no bottles of bourbon in the desk drawer.)

Guess you didn't hear about the law change. Beginning Jan 1st, 2017 it will be legal to bring your homebrew into any establishment that has a liquor license.

 

[Roland_deschain]

Wisconsin? Anything goes, pretty much. Sales 7 days a week, some counties say 9:00 pm is when sales stop for the day. Kids can be in bars or liquor stores and, if with a parent or guardian, a kid can even be served. First offense DUI is a civil forfeiture (I.e., not a crime). Liquor depts don't have to be isolated from the rest of the grocery store. They can hand out samples of beer, wine and liquor - yes, free samples of 80 proof liquor in the grocery store. I could go on.

https://youtu.be/7WlwumGkSec

Lewis Black explains it all on drinking in Wisconsin.

 

[eigua]

CA: Free for all. yay!

We can't buy alcohol in a store or bar or even drink it in an establishment after 2 AM. We also have restrictions on max ABV, no drinking in public places or in parks for the most part (even though everyone does it), and a lot of other rules.

-------------

Source: https://www.abc.ca.gov/questions/enforcement_faq1.html

Q. 84. What are the lawful hours for retail sale of alcoholic beverages?

A. From 6 a.m. to 2 a.m. of the following day. In other words, it is unlawful to sell alcoholic beverages either by the drink or by the package, between the hours of 2 a.m. and 6 a.m. of the same day.
It is also unlawful for any person to knowingly purchase any alcoholic beverages between the hours of 2:00 a.m. and 6:00 a.m. (Section 25631)

Q. 86. May an on-sale licensee stack drinks or sell and serve drinks a few minutes before 2 a.m. and permit patrons to remain on the premises consuming alcoholic beverages after that hour?

A. No. It is a misdemeanor for any retail licensee or employee of the licensee to permit any person, including himself, to consume alcoholic beverages on the licensed premises between 2 a.m. and 6 a.m. of the same day. (Section 25632)

 

[BentBrewer]

Guess you didn't hear about the law change. Beginning Jan 1st, 2017 it will be legal to bring your homebrew into any establishment that has a liquor license.

Actually, as of last week, having heard of changes, I'd been told..... nothing changed.

I'll check into it.

 

[HCbrewing]

So, I've moved around a lot recently and the vastly different laws for alcohol are very strange to me. Now some of these may have changed recently, but as of the last time I was there

TN : No sales on Sunday. Because, you know, you can only drink on Sunday if you bought it on Sunday I guess.
IL: Pretty much like CA, but some weird stuff around happy hours and giving discounts.
MO: Seems pretty normal, but there's probably something weird.

This must only be true in certain counties in TN because I bought some Yuengling from a gas station while passing through TN on a Sunday this July.

IL legalized happy hour this year.

MO actually allows you to drink in a moving vehicle as long as you aren't the driver which is awesome.

 

[HCbrewing]

Indiana: All Sunday alcohol sales banned unless you're at a bar or brewery where the beer is brewed. So no liquor stores/gas stations/etc.

Ohio is very relaxed.

What's crazy about Indiana, we went to a Colts game a couple years ago and you can buy a beer in a bar on a Sunday and carry it out and walk around and drink (the bars will actually give you a to go cup to do this), but you can't go to the gas station and buy a 6 pack. Makes no sense.

 

[treacheroustexan]

What's crazy about Indiana, we went to a Colts game a couple years ago and you can buy a beer in a bar on a Sunday and carry it out and walk around and drink (the bars will actually give you a to go cup to do this), but you can't go to the gas station and buy a 6 pack. Makes no sense.

Right. We drive up to 3 Floyds a few times a year and every time on Sunday when we come home it sucks because we can't go to any bottle shops or anything to take home.

 

[NoIguanaForZ]

In response to the question of "What's up with that?" the answer is that the collective, hydra-headed DOFRA ("Department of Frivolous Restrictions on Alcohol) crawled from the unholy concordance of a medley of cartoonishly narrowminded economic interests and sour grapes among the shambling corpses animated by A Haunting Fear That Someone, Somewhere, May Be Happy over Prohibition being sent back to the sewer that spawned it.

...so to speak.

 

[Ayerate]

Ontario, Canada: Prior to late 2015, alcohol could only be purchased from either government-run liquor stores (LCBO), or "The Beer Store": a retail chain mostly owned by international beer conglomerates (Molson-Coors, InBev, Sapporo, etc). LCBO sells every kind of booze, while TBS just sells beer, and malt-based coolers. You can only buy beer in "bulk" (anything bigger than a 6-pack) from TBS.

As of now, a small number of grocery stores can sell beer and cider in 6-pack quantities or less, and they're planning to start allowing wine sales by the end of the year.

Most other provinces I believe are similar in having government run liquor stores and some form of private beer/wine sales, ie: in Quebec you can buy beer and wine at grocery and convenience stores. Alberta being the notable exception in privatizing liquor sales completely.

 

[Homercidal]

Ontario, Canada: Prior to late 2015, alcohol could only be purchased from either government-run liquor stores (LCBO), or "The Beer Store": a retail chain mostly owned by international beer conglomerates (Molson-Coors, InBev, Sapporo, etc). LCBO sells every kind of booze, while TBS just sells beer, and malt-based coolers. You can only buy beer in "bulk" (anything bigger than a 6-pack) from TBS.

As of now, a small number of grocery stores can sell beer and cider in 6-pack quantities or less, and they're planning to start allowing wine sales by the end of the year.

Most other provinces I believe are similar in having government run liquor stores and some form of private beer/wine sales, ie: in Quebec you can buy beer and wine at grocery and convenience stores. Alberta being the notable exception in privatizing liquor sales completely.

Take off, Hoser!

 

[beernutz]

Alabama: You can buy beer and wine pretty much everywhere except only after Noon on Sundays. Liquor has to be bought from a liquor store.

There are some dry counties left I believe where everything is off limits. I remember as a kid, we lived in Walker county for a while and my folks would have to make runs to the county line. Eventually, they made Jasper (the main city in Walker County) wet, so folks didn't have to do that any longer. Seems odd having a dry county with a wet city inside of it.

After having grown up in Alabama in the 70's where keg beer was mostly illegal and no Sunday sales were allowed I'm happy to say we've mostly moved into the 20th century wrt alcohol laws and regulations. Perhaps before I leave this world we'll make it into the 21st.

Right now we're in that odd period where regulations are being relaxed or removed such as homebrewing being legalized in 2013 and brewery taprooms being able to offer beer-to-go this year but the alcohol regulators are mostly clueless about how to deal with these changes. Even when these laws do change they are often done differently than in most of the rest of the US. For example here is the essence of the new homebrewing regulations:

The statute limits production to 15 gallons per calendar quarter and possession at any time to 15 gallons. The statute allows for transport of homemade beer, mead and cider in amounts of no more than 10 gallons and only for organized events of homebrew competitions and judgings licensed by the Alcoholic Beverage Control Board as a special events retail license. Such homebrew competitions and judgings cannot be held on the premises of entities otherwise licensed by the Alcoholic Beverage Control Board.

So we can legally brew only 60 gallons a year and can have no more than 15 gallons at a time. So much for legally using my 4 tap keezer. Homebrewing competitions and judging must be licensed by the ABC board and can't be held at any place which holds a liquor license which I think is somewhat strange and unusual.

In typical Alabama fashion, because the beer-to-go legislation limited the amount able to be taken away to 288oz per day the alcohol enforcement regulators, the ABC, are now debating how to enforce this limit with one proposal being to have everyone taking beer away from a brewery fill in a form with their name, address, phone etc. Invasion of privacy and onerous regulations much?

I can't wrap my brain around how this proposal would even work. I walk into a brewery and order some beer to go. I would guess at that point I have to fill in a form and the proprietors would then look through the other forms filled in for that day's sales to see if I'd already bought beer to go. If I had they'd have to add up the amounts to see that I was still under the daily limit. And they have to do this for every single customer. Sure, that sounds like a perfectly reasonable scenario to me.

 

[mullet6577]

I live in west TN. In the suburb I'm in, there are no alcohol sales in stores on Sunday but you can go to a restaurant/bar and drink. I can drive 10 - 15 minutes in just about any direction and be in a different suburb/municipality/city and buy beer on Sunday as long as it's after noon.
Only liquor stores can sell above 6.29% ABV beers, but grocery stores can now sell wine (as of July.)
My in-laws live in a dry county in MS. The TN state line is about 10 minutes away with a store that sells beer just across the line. The police tend to sit and watch for people going over and back in a short amount of time.

 

[Pratzie]

You think some states are bad, get a load of this bull**** in my home state of PA.

http://www.pennlive.com/entertainment/index.ssf/2016/09/pa_liquor_law.html

And I have a good friend who works in Liquor Enforcement and he talks about it all the time how the laws are still Prohibition aged and a complete joke.

 

[catdaddy66]

You think some states are bad, get a load of this bull**** in my home state of PA.

http://www.pennlive.com/entertainment/index.ssf/2016/09/pa_liquor_law.html

And I have a good friend who works in Liquor Enforcement and he talks about it all the time how the laws are still Prohibition aged and a complete joke.

PA is also the state that put Tommy Chong in prison for 9 months after shipping bongs across its border.

Just saying...

 

[bruteforce]

You think some states are bad, get a load of this bull**** in my home state of PA.

http://www.pennlive.com/entertainment/index.ssf/2016/09/pa_liquor_law.html

And I have a good friend who works in Liquor Enforcement and he talks about it all the time how the laws are still Prohibition aged and a complete joke.

I visit philly most christmases. The laws are bizarre. No one can sell beer except the official beer store or bars. Except, like, we really want Wegmans, so I guess they can. And oh, Giant too I guess. But screw the rest of ya'll.

Boggles the mind.

 

[eigua]

You think some states are bad, get a load of this bull**** in my home state of PA.

http://www.pennlive.com/entertainment/index.ssf/2016/09/pa_liquor_law.html

And I have a good friend who works in Liquor Enforcement and he talks about it all the time how the laws are still Prohibition aged and a complete joke.

From the article:

"Sadly, it meant that I had no choice but to destroy the contraband if I wanted to stay on the right side of the law."

He immediately set upon destroying said contraband by means of his liver.

 

[A2HB]

Got to love FL on 40 oz's too...

FL: Wont sell 40's because they're gang related...

Huh??

 

[bossman]

The only thing that bothers me about NY liquor laws is that you can't get beer from the liquor stores. Coming from WI, I feel like my beer options would be better if a store that specialized in alcohol was allowed to carry beer. Instead, it's mostly only available at the tiny corner stores or tiny grocery stores (NYC). Yes I know I could go to one of the couple beer specialty stores but those are few and far between and liquor stores are everywhere.

 

[NoIguanaForZ]

After having grown up in an Alabama in the 70's where keg beer was mostly illegal and no Sunday sales were allowed

Must be nice to see Alabama starting to grow up too.

 

[NoIguanaForZ]

Huh??

"Gang-related" is a euphemism.

 

[jmill]

When I was in college in Memphis, I remember discovering the wondrous world of Walgreens across the river in Arkansas. They had liquor/beer stores attached to the Walgreens, and had a ridiculous variety for a Walgreens. We were excited to find 5L mini kegs of Fat Tire since New Belgium wasn't selling east of the Mississippi at the time.

Back near my neck of the woods in Memphis, we had Rite Aid and you were lucky to find a major brewery's faux-craft brew.

 

[bobeer]

Huh??

ya true story... One of the liquor distributors told me that when I lived down there. Ever been to FL? Ever seen 90's rap music videos? It's not koolaid in those paper bags :fro:

 

[crazyjake19]

Can't buy beer after 3am here. Not sure if that's our county, or all of NY. I tried to argue my point that everything is after 3am (except 3:00am), but to no avail. Just have to go to the store before work if I'm running low, gotta plan ahead.

 

[JonM]

So in Milwaukee County, retail sales stop at 9:00. The county just to the south allows sales until midnight. (Or at least that was the deal when I was in school.) So you can imagine that people who didn't plan ahead make beer runs to Racine County between 9:00 and midnight.

I did that once when I was in college, but our approach was to find a sober person and offer him a 12-pack in exchange for the ride to Racine. Im sure lots of others just drove down there half in the bag when they ran out of beer.