Beer Laws In MN

Where did you visit in michigan? I was on a week long beer tour last month and had some great beer at smaller breweries. Did you have the chance to hit Greenbush?

 

As far as the airfare goes, I guess I am not sure how much it goes in other cities. But, I have always thought the prices are reasonable as long as another airline made the same trip (competition). But, if Delta (Northwest, previously) was the only direct flight, then the fares skyrocket. As an example, Portland, OR flights (direct, round trip) is $591, but Seattle (which Alaska also has direct flights) is $421. Competition seems to be driving the cost down. Obviosly searches create different costs.

 

Well, I've managed to derail this thread nicely!

Ultimately for me it boils down to two points. One, not being able to buy booze on Sundays makes zero difference in my life, & two, I'd hate for the rules to change mid-stream & a lot of little mom-and-pop liquor stores have to pay the price to the benefit of Cub, Rainbow, & Byerly's. I'd rather have the mom-and-pops & keep things the way they are, thank you very much.

 

Beer is a splendid & wonderful thing. There should be as few legal and economic hindrances as possible to its production, distribution, accessibility, and enjoyment.

 

Why? I don't understand this. Food used to only come from mom and pop stores and the prices were higher and the selection more limited. Laws shouldn't be on the books to help a few small business owners in not changing their practices. If grocery stores could sell beer, some small liquor stores might suffer, but people would still go to craft beer heavy stores for the superior selection and service. Every state I have been to that has beer in grocery stores still has plenty of liquor stores and even a few craft beer shops.

Imagine if you couldn't buy something like toilet paper on a Sunday and on the other six days of the week you could only buy it at certain stores. Sure, you could think ahead and buy enough so that you never run out on a Sunday, or refrain from taking a shit on Sundays, and suck it up for a special trip to the TP store the other six days of the week, but wouldn't it just make more sense if you could buy it almost anytime you want from a broad selection of retailers?

 

If I expand on your point. The stores do not want to be open 7 days, for 6 days worth of sales.

 

Living in Iowa I am completely dumbfounded by this law it seems backwards and out of date! Minnesota is trying to make its self into to this great craft beer destination but your prohibition era laws are really holding it back. I know all you folks in Minnesota look at Iowas craft beer scene and chuckle but we can buy it on Sundays so who's laughing now

 

I don't want to pick on your post, but, man!

If you don't understand it, go back & read it again. Yes, food only used to come from mom & pop stores, but it was also made closer to the consumer & was fresher (just like our current beer movements). "People would still go to craft beer heavy stores for superior selection & service". This is a direct contradiction of your first statement - if better "service" mattered that much, all those mom & pop groceries would still be alive. "Some small liquor stores might suffer". Only if by that you mean "suffer" = "go out of business" & "some might" = "somewhere between several & a bunch will".

And toilet paper? You might not have noticed, but alcohol is a controlled product & toilet paper is, well, a wood product. Do you really expect them to be regulated the same? Because if so, I have some lovely real estate in Nigeria that my friend Michael Adeuwommi is selling...

To think that liquor small stores, even those that cater to us beer geeks, wouldn't suffer is naive at best. If grocery stores get into the business it will impact the top line, margins, & profitability negatively. And that will mean closed stores, lost expertise, & fewer options for us, the consumer.

 

My favorite part of this is that people actually drive to WI to buy light beer on Sunday. The difference between light beer and "3.2" is SO minuscule and not worth the time, energy, or gas to go get. Just get the 3.2 stuff, vertually the same thing.

 

Being able to buy on Sunday would make a difference in my life and quite frankly I don't give a shit if some crappy small mom and pop store were run out of business cause they had high prices and average service. So, I'm in favor of changing the archaic laws. Wisconsin seems to be just fine for good places to buy beer.

 

Unfortunately, less competition brings about higher prices in the long run. If the mom and pop stores go out of business, the larger stores will control the pricing.

I am still in favor of changing the laws. I just don't want the grocer's association to try piggybacking their desire to carry liquor and wine on the back of this legislation.

 

Please ask Wisconsinites if their beer more or less expensive than in MN. I will grant you that it may in part be due to lower taxes, but the larger stores certainly don't control pricing. In most instances, it's cheaper to buy at the larger stores so I don't buy that argument.

 

Be careful what you wish for.

 

The fact of the matter is grocery stores ONLY carry the top 20 SKU's in each category. Which means you will NEVER see any some cool little brewery or any current small brewery in the grocery stores. If I am any brewery who is brewing less than 10,000 barrels of beer I would not be happy with grocery stores selling beer, wine or liquor.

 

Any which way you all want to look at it, the grocery stores have already started to get themselves into the market by opening attached, but seperate liquor stores. And, those are carrying more than just the top 20 SKU's.

So whether laws change or not, the grocers are budging in anyway.

 

Correct. Most will not carry all the limited release stuff people search out for. It will never happen.

 

So if most of them will only carry the top 20 SKU's, then you still have a market for the more specialized store that do.

So really... You just countered your own point.

Lets go another way. Walmart sells guns. But they only sell the top 10 guns they think they can move. And there still manage to be specialized gun stores around helping out with better service and a nicer product selection.

 

But I'm sure you've seen the numbers about the low % of craft beer is sold compared to the overall beer market (4-7% depending on whether you're talking volume or dollars). It's growing steadily, but that's not much.

Plenty of good stores sell craft beer, but they rely on Mich Golden & Budweiser to keep the lights on. Take away velocity from those high-volume SKUs & your top line shrinks significantly. Despite what you read on this web site, us nut-jobs who drive around looking for good beer are still very much in the minority, & we wouldn't be able to support much in the way of specialty-heavy stores.

I just visited Petschen's Southview Liquor on South Robert Street today, & do so as often as possible. A Cub Liquor opened almost directly behind them, & I'd bet the farm that they're hurting. And it's a good little store. I'd hate to see it close.

 

The cub near me already has a liquor store. It's across the street from Sids that is doing fine last I checked. Down the street Sam's has a liquor store attached.

So what part of this law is going to change the fact they already have liquor stores at large retailers?


Your saying they will push out the little guy, yet it seems, even though they already have stores, the little guys are there and doing okay.

 

Having a few big chains with stores attached is waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay different than allowing it across the board, so that argument is disingenuous at best. I suspect you know that. Do you honestly believe it would have no impact on small, family-run stores? Because the history of economics & scale aren't on your side.