MA Alcohol Task Force accepting public comments

Thanks so much for summarizing things since that PDF is more reading than I'm willing to do on the topic.

What's up with #4 though? Aren't discounts for buying in quantity pretty foundational to the way our entire economy works? I'm sure I must be missing something.

 

A slap in the face to consumers, a boon to industry insiders (75% of MA mom n pop package stores should be allowed to die with big box store competition IMO) & an effect of adding more “enforcement “ personnel to their gov agency. Living in the nanny state is great ain’t it?

 

I would be more supportive of mom and pop stores if there was a universal locator for stuff that I am looking for. Need a Willet's single barrel Rye? Sure, Joe's Packy in Waltham has two bottles.

Having to run all over the damn place to find what I am looking for just isn't great. I don't need Total Wine to be cheaper. I just want to be able to stop at one or two freaking places.

 

These would both be horrendous for consumers in MA. Everybody hates the three tier until it's gone and with it the protections of consumer choice and against big beer. I haven't read the specific ownerships allowed, but the slope in this case is mighty slippery.

 

That's fair enough I guess, but at 10% is it even worth changing the law to allow?

 

10%! I would argue that no one in the same family (brothers, cousins, anything) should be able to own anything between the tiers. The system is already so rigged and ridiculous that the prohibitions should be onerous and significant in terms of conflicts.

 

I watched this play out at Slumbrew about a month ago. They don't do fills any more, but a lady walked in with an old growler "that had been rolling around in her trunk for two months" and wanted them to fill it, but clean it first.

The guy was able to tell her that they had cans of all the available beers for sale, so he avoided having to politely tell her she was a moron and that they would not be cleaning OR filling the growler. I'm sure that happens more frequently than most of us suspect since I'm guessing the folks who bother to post her know enough to clean their own growlers.