Contact your Representative NOW

Do not let Senator McIlhinny and his Big Step Sideways liquor plan become what we will have to live with for decades to come. Make no mistake: if this goes through, there will be no further change to Pennsylvania's liquor and wine sales for years. We'd be much better off staying with the system as it is today for another year and fixing it properly than taking this Frankenstein plan that Senator McIlhinney has been pushing for the past three years. Ask yourself: where did this plan that no one really wants come from? Why is he so sure this is the way to do things? And the most important question: cui bono? Who benefits? 

Write your Representative today and remind them that REAL privatization is what we want. Below is the letter I wrote to my Representative; feel free to use it or change it as you wish.

Dear Representative xxxxxxxxxxx,

I urge you and your colleagues, with the utmost vigor, to reject the half-baked plan of Senator McIlhinny. He has been an obstructionist to the privatization movement for years and continues in that role now.  The citizens want privatization: private stores, selling to private individuals and businesses, while buying whatever they want from private wholesalers. Anything less means a continuation of the gross ineptitude, graft and malaise that is the current PLCB.

The selling of retail products is not part of government, the regulation of those products is. A simple concept that needs to be adhered to.

Sincerely,

xxxxxxxxxxx

What modernization can do.

Modernization may improve this:

But it will never get you to this.

Wine & the Modern (non-PLCB) World

More "Modernization": direct wine shipments in the Commonwealth! Pretty exciting stuff...kind of. On a closer inspection, what the PLCB and their Democratic supporters in the Legislature are proposing ain't all that exciting, and it certainly won't make the money Governor Wolf thinks it will.

In the first place, this isn't really "modernization," or some great plan, but more like forced compliance. The Supreme Court passed down the Granholm Decision 10 years ago, which basically said that states have to treat in-state and out-of-state wineries the same. Yet here we are, 10 years later, and Pennsylvania still hasn't complied. Without an enforceable law in place, you could argue that makes shipping wine into the state legal anyway. I'm not a lawyer, but the couple I've talked to about this have agreed. Of course, you would have to declare it and pay taxes (using the non-existent forms the PLCB doesn't provide) to fully comply with the law. It's only been a decade, so I'm sure they'll have those forms ready by 2020 or so.

When the Legislature finally gets around to complying with Granholm, they'll have to make a choice on how to handle direct shipping. One option is to just not do it at all, make shipping wine completely illegal, but that's probably not how things will go. Then there are two types of direct shipping states: "reciprocal" and "permit."

Reciprocal states say, 'We'll accept your wines if you accept ours.' It's quick, easy, good for the consumer, no fuss, no muss. Permit states require that shipping wineries may have to sign up, pay fees, collect taxes, file forms with sales data (like who they shipped to and how much), limit availability, and be subject to audit of their books to make sure every cent is squeezed out that they can get.

If there's an easy way to do it, and a hard way...you guessed it, the permit state model is what the PLCB and the Legislature are proposing, only more so. They want ALL of that permit state intrusion, plus the wine has to be put in special packaging that isn't required by any other state. You can see how popular this will be with out of state wineries. I'm sure that they'll flock to the PLCB, overwhelming them with permit requests, like the 55 currently signed up (in only 10 years!).  Who knows? It may even get to 100!

So what does direct shipment of wine as proposed actually do for you? Not much, but it does keep power in the hands of the PLCB, by making you go through them. However, you still won't get what you want, the way you want it, because if the PLCB can get it by SLO, you won't be allowed to order it direct. If the winery doesn't agree to all of the above terms, you are completely SOL. This, to keep an entire department employed that would otherwise be mostly gone if you could order things yourself. Another fine use of your tax dollars. (Don't even try to say the PLCB doesn't use tax dollars. Every penny they take in is a use tax, if it weren't, you would be allowed to "use" it someplace else. Like ordering wine direct from a producer.)

So there you have it, the system that some people think will increase sales $325 million above what they do now with those 55 wineries who are currently signed up. Why shouldn't it? It has all the convenience and consumer friendliness we have come to expect from the state stores these past 80 years.

We are not safer, we are not better served and we are not satisfied. The government should regulate, not retail. Move Pennsylvania back to normal.

Don't mend it: end it.

What I Like about the PLCB

...
??
Hmmm....
No, not that.
Err, maybe...
Nope.
??
Ah, I got it!

It always reminds me why I shop out of state: for price, selection, and service.

Hop across the river and save.

You're not in your state store anymore

Yep, that is a real New Jersey Liquor store. 10,000 wines, over 4,000 spirits and 1,500 beers. 

After 80 years they still can't do inventory

Back in November when their latest annual report was released, the PLCB touted that they had updated their website. I guess reporting bad info more inaccurately is an improvement to them.

Here are just some of the things I found this week.

Laphroaig 25 #36279  - Listed as an "On Line Exclusive!!!" which is true, as long as you don't count the ones sitting on the shelf in Allegheny county.  Plus, you don't want to take advantage of the "restructured the website search engine" they've been bragging about by searching for Laphroaig 25 instead of Laphroaig Single Malt Scotch 25...because if you do, you won't find it.

Buffalo Trace White Dog #30570 - Also listed as an On Line Exclusive, but depending where you look one PLCB website says it isn't available and the the other one says it is. One listing won't find it if you look for Buffalo Trace White Dog and the other one will.

Laphroaig Cairdeas 2014 Edition #36485 - Another one that is listed as not available in the product catalog but is on the website.

Is not the On Line store listed as a store in the annual report?  If the PLCB product catalog says "There were NO Locations found for your selected search ..." and they claim "Store inventory is accurate as of the close of the previous business day", this pretty much shows the brick-and-mortar left hand hasn't a clue what the online right hand is doing. I guess judging by the overall lack of large retail or even alcohol industry experience in the PLCB we, the citizens, should not expect a well-run organization who can keep track of what products are available for sale or not.

Maybe they need to hire an outside consultant for a few million like last time, rename the stores again, and switch the apron colors. Maybe Governor-elect Wolf  can take the executives, after they sign another pledge not to take gifts (since the first one didn't seem to work), and make them wear old Nixon buttons. You know, the ones that said "I Am Not A Crook." That should show the public they are "modernizing" and perhaps save them for a few more months.

We deserve better. If your Representative or Senator doesn't think so, ask them why. Then hit them with some of the stuff you've learned here...and ask them again.

Privatization IS Modernization!

Do it The PLCB Way: let the unqualified lead

I often say the PLCB is poorly run and mismanaged by unqualified people. The list of mistakes, foul-ups, and just plain ignorance is a long and funny read in a perverse sort of way. As the second largest U.S. retailer of wine, the PLCB didn't and still doesn't have a Certified Sommelier on staff. None of the Board has ever run any company even 10% the size of the PLCB. The Chairman's Selection buyer isn't highly certified. There are no educational requirements for management positions...the list goes on and on.

Maybe that is changing. The PLCB now lists a Jennifer Brown as "Specialty Wine Consultant" on their payroll. She's the only one, as of 15 July, but maybe more will follow. So just how qualified is this person to be a "consultant" to the great unknowing mass of cube rats who select what every Pennsylvanian is allowed to buy?  Let's look.

I got a bit excited when I found Jennifer Brown was a certified Sommelier, a member of the Society of Wine Educators, and pursuing entrance into the Master of Wine program, along with attending the Wine Business Program at Sonoma State University in California, including viticulture and enology course work at UC Davis.  But alas...this is not the same Jennifer Brown hired by the PLCB. The one we have is a marketing person who worked or is still working as the Luxury Buyer France/CA of the PLCB Luxury division. You certainly don't want a certified and qualified person doing that job do you?

In fact, she herself lists wine tasting 4th of things she knows best behind Marketing Strategy, Marketing, and Sales.

I don't know about you, but that just about explains everything that I need to know about the selection process for Luxury French and California wine by the PLCB. My advice is go to Moore Brothers and talk to some people who care more about good wine than good marketing.


Oh, and that other Jennifer Brown, the really qualified one, also works in wine marketing -- for a private firm much, much smaller than the PLCB. Lucky them. Too bad for us.

Privatization is Not a Piñata

Looks like the Legislature's been here...

I'm looking at HB790, the proposal that Governor Corbett has put forward for privatization of the the State Store System, and it's becoming clear what the Legislature is in this for: the money. It's not about us, it's not about doing the right thing, it's not about doing what we want, it's about the money.

It's about campaign donations from the unions and businesses, it's about the tax revenue, it's about the shiny promise of a billion bucks in "windfall" money from license fees and wholesaler fees and higher fines and continuing fees... And like I always tell people in other states when their legislators want to raise booze taxes, where do you think all that money's going to come from? Duh, guys: out of your pockets. Because the wholesalers and the retailers aren't going to eat that increase (and no reason we should expect them to), it's part of the price of goods. So the higher the license fees...the higher the prices. It's just a tax under another name. Why, much as I'm pissed about Representative Taylor's planned amendment for HB790, at least he recognizes that, and lowered those fees.

The problem is that the Legislature doesn't look at the booze business like we do: producers and wholesalers and retailers all bringing the wines, spirits, and beers we love to shelves near us, hopefully sold by folks who have the same kind of passion for it that we do (or, hey, by guys who want to make picking up the basics quick and easy). They don't look at it like those in the industry do, as a fair business that makes a decent profit and pays good wages. They don't even look at it like MADD and the neo-prohibitionists do, as the devil's handmaidens, selling pure liquid evil.

No, the Legislature looks at the booze business -- brewers, distillers, vintners, importers; wholesalers, retailers; bars, delis, restaurants, taverns, stadium concessions -- as a big piñata, stuffed full of revenue, the money that makes things work in Harrisburg. Yes, the money that builds roads (and drips down to corrupt the fat cats), and pays for the State Police, and higher education, and state parks, and so on and so on, and it's also the money that gets doled out to make friends happy, and pay for patronage work, and all the semi-shady crap that's been going on in Harrisburg...it's all revenue, and that's really how the Legislature sees the booze business: a piñata, dangling in front of them, bulging with bucks, and the stick's in their hands.

Step right up, Senator! See the beer distributors, gorged with the fruits of their semi-monopoly? WHACK! The bars, making money in cash, helped along by the limited competition the licensing system creates? WHACK! The wholesalers, a layer of markup forced onto the others by three-tier laws -- WHACK! -- the brewers, newly successful craft brewers and the roaring Yuengling -- WHACK! -- Pennsylvania's wineries, ignored by the State Store but making people happy with festival fun -- WHACK! --the new distillers, better teach them how it works before they get too big -- WHACK! -- and the grocers and drugstores, wow, new blood! -- WHACK! WHACK!

 WHACK!

And then...the piñata breaks. The revenue tumbles out! Oh boy, grab it, shovel it into your committee bags, scoop it up to take home to your campaign contributors! Don't worry about the broken shell of the piñata. Don't worry; the system has limped along for decades, made to work by dedicated people who worked within the ridiculous cage of complicated laws you made, who did their best to try to bring the citizens what other states' peoples took for granted. It doesn't matter if you don't get this right: you've been ignoring what's wrong with the State Store System for over 40 years, you can ignore the mess you're going to make with privatization, too.

Don't let this happen. Call your representatives, email them, visit them if you can. Go to Facebook, tell Representative Taylor that you want real privatization, not some watered-down "modernization." Here are some talking points, bullet points, really.

• License fees are too damned high.
• There are too many different types of license, and the mistake of the "case law" is repeated in multiples with all the different arbitrary limits on how much each license can sell in one transaction.
• Beer distributors should not be charged a special fee to sell sixpacks, and there shouldn't be a minimum sale of a sixpack: do away with these ridiculous minimum and maximum sales altogether.
• Privatize fully, NOW. Give them 6 months. 

Don't break the system to get at all the money inside. Free it up, and collect the extra taxes you'll get when people no longer feel the need, the urge, to avoid the screwed-up mess we have and buy across the border.

And most of all...there is no windfall. If the State Store System really were the "valuable public asset" the unions keep trying to tell us it is, some company would be offering you money to take it over and run it. It's not. It's an annoyance. The people of the state despise it, and can't wait to see it gone. Forcing the new licensees to pay for it is just...whacking the piñata.
 

The State Stores have had 80 years to get it right. They haven't, they won't. Game over. PRIVATIZE.