Liquor Store Pet Peeves

This annoys me more then anything. So much so that my local favorite establishment now has their banners state that 'Miller Coors and Bud" instead of domestics. The owner has actually stated that he no longer gets the questions about domestics and/or any issues with the wording. He appreciated every bit of the $10 it took to change his banners. Especially since every tapper he has is a Domestic beer.

 

how did a liquor store thread become a discussion on bars?

 

Prices irk me. I can go to a big store in Branford CT that I like because of the selection but dislike because their prices are high. There is a much smaller store with a decent craft selection and their prices are consistently better by $1-4 depending on the product. Seems the bigger store would have the better pricing due to volume. Alas... So now I get my FBS and Old Raspy at the smaller store.

 

I was just complaining about this after going to the new Total Wine in CT yesterday. Shelves organized by style, but the brewery I was looking for was all together in the coolers, not on the style organized shelves. Employees figured they just didn't have waht I was looking for.

 

No. 1 - stock rotation. Get the old stuff off the shelf.

No. 2 - dirty, disorganized, unkempt, untidy - whatever you want to call it. Don't expect spotless (well, as a food industry professional I actually do), but some effort into keeping the section clean and organized is important. Thinking of the old "packy" down the street that smells of sour beer and moldy cardboard...

No. 3 - staff lacking even rudimentary knowledge.

 

Also, when everything in the craft beer section is covered in a fine layer of dust. I see this on southside and westside Chicago pretty often.

 

i only really have a problem if they're not organized. i went to my first total wine over the weekend, what a mess!
but i did land a couple of bottles of Event Horizon, which they had in the back.

 

Hmmm...a few comments about staff in the thread made me think. Most times I don't have a specific target in mind when I walk in the door. I'm content to browse, take my time, and buy whatever takes my fancy. So the overzealous "can I help you" extra-perky types can be annoying, but at least they are making an effort and trying to be helpful. I will politely decline most times. The times when I am looking for something specific and get the deer in the headlights look - that would be bad...

And it is a two-way street. There's more than enough a$$hole customers to go 'round, I reckon. Have to look at it from the other side of the counter too. (I would have edited this in, but time expired...work interferes yet again...)

 

This is not really a pet peeve that is the stores fault but I went to my local store and grabbed a bottle of Fort and Bitches Brew and at the register the owner asked for ID obviously something they have to do ( I was 23 at the time) I go there about once a weekend have dealt with him many times ordering or reserving a beer.

This time however he asked for a second form of ID so I showed him My Credit Card and I showed him a school ID just so he was sure. He looked at them for a while and I could tell he was really hesitating to sell to me or not, so said I have another card if you want to see it I've been coming here weekly for over a year. I was kind of getting impatient and annoyed so I added " Seriously how many under age kids come in here and spend over 30$ for two bottles of beer and have 4 valid forms of ID" So anyways sold them to me. Must have caught him on a bad day or maybe they had recently gotten in trouble for selling to a minor

 

I'm an hour and 20 minutes from the nearest craft beer suppliers... they all list things online that don't exist on the shelves. There's nothing worse than traveling that far and finding out they haven't and stuff in a long time.

 

No more Pappy 20...that is my pet peeve

 

That's pretty bad, especially when I live on the opposite side of the state. I travel alot on business and my last time buying beer in the Pittsburgh area I was totally fed up. When the clerk rang up the total I snickered and asked if that came with a jar of vaseline, the person just stood there staring at me like I had (3) heads - it was one of those Jeff Dunham and Peanut moments, "Eeeeeeee-ow!" (right over their head). Needless to say I don't buy much beer there any more when I pass through unless it's extra special and can't be passed up. I don't know how you folks tolerate it, especially since you have some of the best beer bars in one place of the five states I travel.

 

luckily i usually just go to my local store and im friends with the guy as he happens to be a beer lover himself so i dont get this. usually im trying to buy the stuff he sets off for himself like the bottle of zhukov e had the other night. wish he would of parted with it

 

Its hard because if someone breaks up a sixer, then the store is left with 5 singles that will most likely not sell for a year. I say either go all in with a mix a six program or don't sell single 12 oz bottles at all.

 

Yea the store i go to usually keeps 6 out as singles until they run out then break up another 4-6.

 

Working at a liquor store, I can understand many of the pet peeves and agree with many. However many of them are just impossible whether it be due to shelf space, cooler space etc, floor space. In the end, store owners need to make money and pay the bills just like everyone else and they can't make all of us beer geeks happy all the time.

 

when a store has a website..
and the website has an email address..
and they encourage patrons to use it, "ASK US"..
and then you use it..
and then they totally ignore you.

This happens like a good 80% of the time.
Pretty rude man.

 

I know this is not about liquor stores, but I ROUTINELY see Sierra Nevada Pale Ale and Sam Adams Boston Lager listed as imports. IT HAS THE LOCATION IN THE NAME! Sierra Nevada = USA. BOSTON Lager = very clearly USA.

 

Really? In Minnesota? That's crazy. I bet in a few years you guys will have even more craft beer awareness. That would irk me too.

My pet peave is finding a beer at stores elsewhere that my store in my building charges 3-4 dollars more for. Not cool.

 

$18 dollars for a 6er of Deschuttes beer? Is this in India or something? I can get it for about 7 or 8 dollars a lot of times here in CO.