When is a person less than 1 person? (1 bottle/person limits)

Haven’t had this happen. But I can understand why it does. Beer retailers are stuck between a rock and a hard place with this shit. Either they’re perceived to allow muling or they’re sexist. Maybe there should be a three question quiz at the counter.....

 

I've never heard of the 1 per couple rule. Not saying it doesn't exist, but I've never seen it. Anytime I've seen 1pp it's always meant 1pp. That's why you have all these running jokes of people bringing their grandparents/wives/girlfriends on line to places like Other Half and Tree House.

My bottle shop guy is always strict about beer with a 1pp rule, but he always counts couples as 2 people. Just this past weekend, I had to get my wife out of the car and come stand by the counter so I could buy 2 Black Notes.

 

Standing in line early Friday for BCBS, I heard the woman behind me ask her boyfriend or husband "now what kind of beer is this?"
She got the same allotment as everybody else.
If they try to implement/enforce 1 per couple, they're going to end up with a lot more time wasted on single transactions vs 2 people, 2 allotments, 1 transaction.

 

I’m not condoning it at all. I’m just saying I get why it happens.

 

Perhaps they could still discourage muling by requiring that the per person limit must be separate transactions? I dunno how much of a deterrent that would be.

 

There's no way to logically uphold that sort of policy. That's the reason limits are there in the first place.

And sorry to hear you had this happen at H 'n T, I've had nothing but fantastic customer service there, personally.

 

A "policy" (or lack thereof, I guess) of providing 1 beer pp except to couples that the cashier believes are together.

 

In my opinion, it's not the cashier's job or duty to enforce anything other than the stated rule of 1 bottle per person. To assume that two people are romantically linked or that a guy is using a woman as a mule is way out of bounds. Who is to say you aren't sharing the bottles or drinking them separately? While I'm aware of how common the 'beer mule' is these days, it's almost welcoming confrontation by taking this type of approach with customers. I haven't seen many breweries take this stance and I don't think bottle shops should either.

 

if a clerk tried this with my wife, he would end up extracting said bottle from a rather sensitive place. Hell, she's been homebrewing for 25 years, and she knows her beers.

 

I have NO problem at all with limits, and even low limits. By all means, spread the beer to as many prospective clients as you can. Make 200 people happy instead of 50 people REALLY happy and 150 people disgruntled. It get it.

But trying to impose a "per couple" limit is problematic for myriad reasons. One, that's straight-up not what the language 'one beer/4-pack/case per person' says. Two, as others have pointed out, it assumes any two people together are a couple. That's idiocy. Three, there's an underlying sexism here in the assumption that if Tom and Mary Smith come in, that Mary is just buying a bottle/4-pack/case so that Tom can have two, not because she wants one herself.

TL;DR This is a gross practice and I wouldn't shop in any store that tried to implement it.

 

The opposite extreme is a guy gets to the counter with his gf looking bored/confused, nana in her wheelchair and the guy that causes you to double take as he looks very like the homeless guy you see regularly a couple blocks away, and says “all four of us would like our bottle of BCBCS please - my treat”.

Somewhere between that scenario and the scenario of the couple with matching Weyerbacher Riserva face tattoos, there’s a line where a good clerk who understands the reason for limits should ask some questions. Where that line is is obviously very hard to say and a potential minefield.

Obv in op’s case they were out of line.

 

This is the first time I have ever heard the term 'muling'. I knew people did this, but didn't know it was so prevalent that a term was created. I guess it's good that I don't really care about the really, really limited stuff (1 bottle pp nonsense).

 

This happened to me last year. Two of us walked into a bottle shop Black Friday looking for BCBS. Said he had a 1 bottle/person limit. He recognized me as I was in there earlier in the week to ask if he would be getting it and to check out the place (the store had only been open a few weeks). He let me buy a bottle but not my friend. My friend goes back the next day and he let him buy a bottle, but would only let him have a BW. I have not been back since.

 

https://www.thedailybeast.com/when-a-craft-beer-is-released-beer-geeks-go-crazy

the infamous Grandma mule picture:
https://www.beeradvocate.com/commun...se-atrial-rubicite.91480/page-13#post-3906736

yes, it's bad when a term originally used for drug smuggling made it's way into craft beer.

 

Hahaha I hadn’t seen that pic before. Quality!