And the winner is...Everybody but Pennsylvania.

Nice to know that the second largest wine retailer in the U.S. (at the moment) only influences a captive monopoly citizenry and nothing else.

Yeah, the PLCB keeps talking "world-class" and walking "second rate." That's certainly the impression you get from Infowine.com's annual list of the top 100 influencers in wine: not one PLCB employee is among them. Numerous other people in retailers like K&L (California) Total Wine (soon to be the #2 retailer ahead of the PLCB) and Costco (currently #1) made the cut. The list includes Masters of Wine (none in the PLCB - ever), winners of  the James Beard Foundation medal for the nation’s outstanding wine and spirits professional (none in the PLCB - ever), Members of the Guild of Sommeliers (none in the PLCB - ever) and innovators from across the country (none in the PLCB - ever...and no, the wine kiosks don't count).

I was part of the Livestock, Dairy,
and Poultry subcommittee. Of course
I'm qualified to be in charge of liquor!

No, Pewnnsylvania gets brainstorms like "A consortium of control states all buying from the PLCB", Wine Kiosks (never forget!!), using buying power to raise prices instead of lower them, and hiring a probation officer to run the whole operation. Just what are those free states thinking with their convenience, selection, and real certified professionals working to expand the boundaries in wine? Fools. They could be selling their customers wine that didn't make the cut in the real world like the PLCB does, and positioning it as some sort of benefit.

Just more examples of how the PLCB can never lead, never bring the citizens of the Commonwealth the same standard that the majority of people in the US enjoy. Just because mediocrity is well lit does not make it what the people want or deserve. People need government to regulate the safety of products, to make sure they aren't abused by things beyond their control, and to insure clean water and air.

They don't need government to decide what wine they're allowed to buy.

Privatize.

Led, managed and staffed by incompetents

Pretty rough title isn't it? Sure, I'll admit it is...unless you can prove it.

Let's keep looking at the "improved product search feature of the Fine Wine & Good Spirits online store," as Chairman Holden called it 2 years ago!. To me, it is still so bad I can't think of anything they actually improved. Just reference the last blog post, where I talked about the PLCB not being able to get the product totals matching across the inventories available to the public; they couldn't even get them to agree on the same page.

The reason for that may be the thousands of dead listings for products no longer carried that the PLCB doesn't clean out of the system. I'm guessing it's because that would be THOUSANDS of products that they could no longer claim when they make their boasts to the public about how many thousands of products they carry. Do you really think that the 2011 Jack Daniel's Holiday Select is coming back?  It's been five fricking years since it was in stock, but it's still listed in the system. Maybe they're still waiting to get that picture before they delete it.

Am I cherry picking? Yep, and here is the 2012 cherry...

And the 2013 cherry too!

You do see the "Out of Stock" on each one, right?

How incompetent to you have to be to keep something on inventory for five years when it is NEVER EVER going to return? Maybe it's because they're using a search system that was probably designed during the punch card era. You want to see how bad the search engine is? Let's look for some Old Forester.

It's going to be hard for the PLCB to admit it, but there aren't 1074 matches to Old Forester, and I guarantee none are Ardbeg, Aberfeldy, or Glenfarclas single malt Scotch whisky. Pretty worthless, isn't it? To add even more intelligence-insulting idiocy, if you look at the "Brand" listing on the left you won't even find Old Forester listed. Should I be more specific in my search?  Go ahead and put in Old Forester Bourbon and see what that gets you. Narrowing it down takes the number of hits from 1074 to 1355, now that's an improvement. No, that isn't a typo: being more specific increases the number of wrong choices to pick from.

Think that's bad? How about the 5,044 choices — of which 5,036 are wrong — for Four Roses:

How do real businesses handle this? You know, the ones that depend on customer satisfaction (because they don't have a police-enforced monopoly)? Let's have a look. Of course none of these are as big as the PLCB or have as many employees, or a $66 million computer system.

Binny's IL

Hi Time Wine CA

France 44 MN

State Line Liquor MD  (you'll have to enter "Old Forester")

This isn't rocket science...unless you work in Harrisburg. Free states have liquor stores with a real inventory of real products you can actually search for and find, and go to the shelf and touch. Not every store, of course, but Wawa ain't Wegmans, either. The PLCB claims to be "world class," so their online inventory system should be world class. It isn't.

The PLCB doesn't really give a damn about you, the consumer. It is easier to put plants in the stores and aprons on the clerks than it is to fix the systemic and inherent flaws in the leadership, management, and operational systems.

Went to see the chairman, strangest I could find,
Laid my proposition down, laid it on the line.
I won't slave for beggar's pay, likewise gold and jewels,
But I would slave to learn the way to sink your ship of fools.

We deserve better - PRIVATIZE!

Who can answer this?

As reported by numerous papers...

If, as Governor Wolf is suddenly proposing, leasing the State Store System to a private management firm "is a way to make the liquor stores more profitable and provide better service to consumers"...can the Governor answer the following seemingly obvious questions about this latest example of Wolfonomics?

Wouldn't a fully private system provide even better service to consumers?

Wouldn't a private system that puts wine and liquor INTO grocery stores -- on the shelves -- be even better than a system that puts it somewhere in the vicinity of grocery stores?

Wouldn't a private system that allows for different levels of service -- small neighborhood stores, wine or whiskey specialty stores, huge discount mega-stores -- be even better than only one that provides only one level of service, for every store, in the entire state? (Keep in mind: it would still be illegal to go across the border.)

Wouldn't a private system that stocks more items than the entire State Store System stocks (and actually has them, instead of just listing them online) now be even better for consumers?

Wouldn't a private system that at least triples employment (as shown by the experience in Washington State and Alberta, which both fully privatized their monopoly systems) be even better for the state and the citizens that are employed than a system that limits employment and doesn't allow any small businesses?

Wouldn't a private system that triples or quadruples convenience (as measured by number of stores) be even better for the consumer than one that will still limit convenience to fewer stores than there were 40 years ago?

Wouldn't a private system where many suppliers try to bring their product to market be even better than one person or department selecting for the entire state? (In case you missed it, this is what happens when one person has that police-enforced monopoly power.)

Wouldn't a private system be even more responsive to consumers needs and wants, since the individual stores would have to compete for your business, rather than you still having no other choice than the monopoly State Store System...whatever the new name they slap on it is?

Wouldn't life just be far better if Pennsylvania had a normal liquor retail market without the state being involved in retail and wholesale at all?

You bet it would.

Can we talk, about these talking points?

Everything below is taken from the March UFCW Wine And Spirits Council talking points. This is what the State Store clerks' union is encouraging their members to use in communications with legislators and public groups to convince them that normalization of the State Stores would be a disaster. We found a few issues with their issues.

• This legislation risks the over $566 million in annual contribution from the PLCB.

Sounds terrible! Except that the PLCB has never contributed $566 million. They did collect taxes, but so did the Department of Revenue -- sales taxes, income taxes -- and they don't claim to have "contributed" $23 billion to the State.

• States that have privatized in the past, such as Iowa and West Virginia, saw dramatic decreases in revenue after they privatized their liquor systems.

But the report on privatization commissioned by Governor Corbett to study the effects of privatization based on the HB 790 plan that PFM* produced, the report that's so frequently quoted by opponents, says this: "Privatization was deemed successful (in Iowa) from a revenue standpoint, with profits increasing by $125 million over the first 11 years of privatization compared to estimates under State control of the stores." Of course, Iowa and West Virginia only privatized retail, not wholesale, and Iowa lowered taxes too. Iowa has over 1,200 places to buy liquor now, with 25% of Pennsylvania's population. And a lower DUI fatality rate.

• PFM predicts there will be 10-­30 wholesalers who will carry a wide array of products in a private wholesale system. This is simply not true in other privatized states, due to only 1 or 2 wholesalers usually operating in private states.

Let's see how true that is. I can name over a dozen wholesale distributors in Washington State in only two years since they privatized. 1. Click 2. Columbia 3. Crown 4. King 5. Marine. 6. Pioneer 7. Stein 8. Vehrs 9. Clatsop 10. Dickerson 11. Maletis 12. Midway 13. Olympic Eagle 14. Sound 15. Tripp 16. Young's 17. Southern.
New York has at least 40 just for wine. Pennsylvania has one - the PLCB. Of course, you don't even need to guess how things will be in a privatized system in Pennsylvania, you can just look at beer. There are over thirty beer wholesalers in the Commonwealth. This one isn't even close.

• ... $1.4  billion over five years that will cost the state to transition from a public system to a private system according to the PFM report commissioned by former Governor Corbett. 

This is a lie that has been told over and over and over, to the press, to the Legislature, to the public, and it simply isn't so. The actual first heading on page 186 of the report is "Total Agency Operating and Transition Costs." So the $1.4 billion is the system's normal operating costs plus any transition costs. The operational costs are almost $1.2 billion! With a little math, you can figure out how much the cost is to keep the PLCB using the very same report. Over $2.2 Billion. How do you like me now?

• This proposal has the potential to put alcohol on every corner possible.

This is just fear mongering. HB 466, the current bill the passed the House, doesn't even get the state up to the national average for liquor stores, let alone for retail wine outlets. To hit average for 12.8 million people, we would need to have over 2400 liquor stores, and over 6,000 grocery stores selling wine.

• A peer-­reviewed study from a U.S. Centers for Disease Control Task Force recommended against any further privatization.    

While the statement itself is true, the entire study methodology and results were debunked by STATS.org. (Debunked by Forbes, too.) This study also said that privatization would lead to a 44% increase in consumption which hasn't happened in any state that privatized any or all of their liquor system. Not even close.

• Studies show that state employees have a much higher rate of carding minors than the private sector does.

Maybe, but Pennsylvania state stores are NEVER checked for compliance, except by "internal" audit. So you can't make a factual statement that it is happening here.

• The Turzai privatization proposal will lead to increased prices and decreased selection.

Somebody on the Council needs to stand in the middle of a Super Buy Rite or a Total Wines or Joe Canal's or BevMo or Binny's and say that. How selection is decreased when a store has more items on the shelf that the entire state of Pennsylvania stocks must be some kind of magic.

A real New Jersey Liquor Store; not near Philly or New York, either.

• No where in the private sector can you find that type of selection in each and every store in the state.

One size doesn't fit all and nowhere in the state can you even begin to find something like the store shown above. Not every PA State Store even has the same stock, and neither will every private store, but you'll certainly be able to find more in the private market.

• The proposal eliminates the 30% markup, yet keeps the 18% Johnstown Flood tax. This will result in dramatic price increases. 

Since the PLCB operates at an effective 45.2% markup and private business is far more efficient there seems to be some room to work with. Will everything be cheaper everywhere? No, just like one store doesn't have the cheapest price on everything. But then, the PLCB doesn't either.

• Prices have gotten so high, that Washington consumers have been driving across the border to both Oregon and Idaho.

Having lived in Washington State, I can tell you first hand: Washington had the highest liquor prices in the country before they privatized. Adding 27% in new "fees" at the time of privatization certainly didn't help. Although they did drop the fee schedule to just an extra 22% recently. Idaho has said their sales are up 7% along the border. Oregon is about the same. The total Washington yearly border bleed is less than 2 weeks of current PA border bleed, so what does that tell you?

• Those who purchased the former state liquor stores from Washington State are already out of business, as they were not able to compete with Costco, Safeway and others.

The one thing that hurt small liquor store owners in Washington was the WSLCB. It was just as bad in making decisions and rulings as the PLCB. They ruled that the small stores had to pay tax on resale product while larger distributors didn't, making the small stores products 17% more expensive for the bars and restaurants that they were selling to. That ruling has since been overturned, but it took over a year to do it. Box stores are still not the majority of sales in Washington. Small stores can compete just fine if given a level playing field. Look at New Jersey and California if you need examples.

• The Turzai proposal will lay off 5,000 Pennsylvanians who work in the Wine and Spirits stores.

Well...there aren't 5,000 people who work for the PLCB (total staff of 4,597 as of 3/15) and certainly not all of them work in the state stores (not with the bloated management structure that is in place). Nor will they all get laid off, either. There will still be a need for administration, licensing, audit and what have you. And a third of the employees in the stores are part-time.


The Wine and Spirits Council seems to believe that consumers, and more importantly, legislators, can't learn from what other states did. That we can't put in place an even better system based on real world data, and not bad reports formed from junk science, or scary commercials where family members get killed off one by one.

Private systems work: just look at how you buy everything else. We don't need State Stores or the people in them to sell a legal product. There are 27,000 licensed establishments in the state and none of them have state workers standing behind the bar, serving or managing. We aren't safer, we aren't better served, and we aren't satisfied and never will be by a state run system.


*Much of the UFCW's "scientific" support for the State Stores as a bulwark against booze-fueled lawlessness leans on a CDC "taskforce" report, largely exposed as junk science by this piece. They lean on cherry-picking out-of-context nuggets on the economics from a report on the impact of liquor privatization prepared by PFM, a Harrisburg think tank. Have a look for yourself; why trust the UFCW, why trust us?  

Did you hear that?

Another domino fell in the fight for open markets and individual freedom as Worcester County, Maryland opened its doors to the free market by closing the county-controlled liquor board that mandated all businesses had to buy from them. (You never hear of places going to the PA way do you?) While the county is still going to try and remain a wholesaler in competition with private businesses, those businesses are free to shop wherever they want.

This could be a good way to gauge if the PLCB would be competitive if faced with free market competition, although the PLCB, with a bloated management and office staff, isn't as efficient compared to the county.

So raise a glass of whatever beverage you enjoy, and wish the people of Worcester County the best as they join most of Maryland and 33 other states in using their freedom of choice. Maryland is right next door, so maybe this will rub off on the group of dunces we have in the Senate as they see how the majority of the country works just fine without any socialist intervention by unqualified cube rats in Harrisburg.

Remember: privatization is modernization! 

PLCB SMACKDOWN

 

It must be their incredible buying power because the difference in taxes doesn't account for the difference in price. Maybe the PLCB can rename a store in response.

Privatization facts & figures

All the arguments against privatization — job losses, revenue losses, public safety endangered, less selection and higher prices, less convenience, and worse service — are addressed and refuted below, with facts and common sense. Arm yourselves with knowledge, and pass it on to your legislators.

Jobs - Everyplace in North America that has privatized some or all of their liquor distribution system has seen an increase in employment. Jobs in the industry tripled in Washington State and Alberta, Canada, the last two places that fully privatized. They doubled in Iowa, which kept wholesale sales but privatized all retail. Are the jobs exactly the same as what they replace? Probably not; are all jobs the same at every store where you shop now? Why would alcohol sales be any different?

Revenue and Border Bleed - Sales have gone up in privatized systems, every single one; how much is dependent on taxation more than anything else. Case in point is Washington State, which already had the highest liquor taxes in the country before they privatized and added new fees. Sales have still gone up in state, and the fee-driven increase in border bleed has increased sales out of state. If they hadn’t raised taxes, in-state sales would have increased even more. Washington State’s border bleed is nowhere near the border bleed rate in PA. The border bleed increase for an entire year in Washington is about a weeks worth of the border bleed PA sees.  While privatization will not eliminate border bleed in PA, it will, just from a convenience standpoint, decrease it. A privatized PA will still not be able to equal pricing of states with lower taxes, but it will make it easier to buy locally. People pay more for convenience all the time, even when less expensive alternatives exist reasonably close. Case in point is buying almost any food or dairy item in a convenience store — “a damn Sheetz,” as Senator Ferlo would snarl — instead of a grocery store. The key is to not raise taxes.

Revenue 2 – Iowa actually decreased their taxation and still reported making more than they would have if they kept their state stores.

Revenue 3 - It isn’t only direct liquor taxation that has to be taken into account. For PA, there will be business taxes that the current system doesn’t pay. There will be more income taxes from owners and workers, since there will be more of each. There will be new jobs created that do not exist under our current system, delivery to bars and restaurants being one example, and increases in current jobs to accommodate new business. Again, just one new warehouse in Washington State employed 1,100 workers, which was more than the entire state store workforce of 937. In the long term, money will be saved by not having taxpayers responsible for future retirement and medical shortfalls. The current amount the taxpayers owe for PLCB pensions is $550 million and is expected to go up to $600 million by the end of this year.

Safety – Under the current system PA has more DUIs, DUI fatalities, underage DUI, binge drinking and underage binge drinking than 4 of the 5 privately run states on our border, and is just average compared to the rest of the country. Washington State has seen an 8% reduction in DUI crashes and DUI fatalities since privatization. While some may claim that is because there was less policing, policing has no effect on the decrease in DUI fatalities. Alberta, Canada has decreased their DUI fatality rate to one of the lowest on the continent (37% lower than PA) since they privatized, even though they have over 1,300 retail liquor outlets now for a population of under 4 million. Is there a connection? No way to say without further study, but it’s plain to see that privatization didn’t make the situation worse.

Safety 2 – Limiting underage access has always been a point for those opposed to privatization. While the true rate of underage purchases in PA State Stores is not known, since they are never independently checked (or policed in undercover sting operations, as privately-owned liquor stores in other states are) it would follow that it should be about the same as other localities which have similar requirements. Washington State was at approximately 93-94% compliance before privatization and is at about 92% now. Another thing we can learn from Washington State’s experience is how to limit direct unobstructed egress to cut down on shoplifting.

Selection - Under the PLCB, urban areas essentially subsidize rural areas for alcohol selection, something that would seem to go against their stated mission of limiting access. This is the retail equivalent of PENNDOT making sure there is a Jaguar dealer in every county, because without government intervention they wouldn’t be there. Where the population can support them there will be larger stores, and in areas that can’t support those, there will be smaller stores. This is the retail model found almost everywhere. It is not the government’s job to make sure you can buy a wide selection of booze, especially when they say it’s detrimental (but they still want to sell you more of it). It is their job to make sure that a business climate exists which will allow retailers to try to sell whatever they want within the regulations and restrictions. To date I have not heard a reasonable explanation as to why the state should subsidize alcohol like they do milk.

Selection 2 - That in-store selection will increase is not in question. One only need to look across the country to stores like Bev-Mo, Total Wine, Roger Wilco, Binny’s, HighTime, B-21 and hundreds of others to see what the private sector can provide. They provide it based on consumer demand, not by what a bureaucrat or committee with unknown or non-existent credentials selects for them in a small capital city, far from major markets. What is in question is what variety will be available in rural areas. The answer is the same as it is for any other product. If the demand is there, the market will provide it, just as it does in rural grocery stores and hardware stores. If what you want is not available locally, chances are you will be able to order it, the same as now, only you probably won’t have to buy a case at a time as it is with a good portion of the current system. The entire state of big, small, specialty, urban, and rural stores will be open to you. Not that every store will ship but it will certainly be more than now, because real businesses strive for customer service since their existence depends on it and not state police enforced monopoly power.

Prices – There are no absolutes in pricing. So much would depend on the system that is selected. Do we continue with the three tier system or do we eliminate one tier and allow more direct buying? Are taxes collected at the wholesale or retail level? Will the taxes increase or remain the same? Depending on what combination is used, you can say that prices should go down or prices should go up. The one thing you can say with certainty is that in a competitive market prices are lower than they would be given the same circumstances in a non-competitive market. As the third largest retail buyer on the continent one would expect the State Stores to have some of the best pricing available in the country. However, this is not always the case and the differences are more than taxes alone can account for.

Convenience – Since closing 20% of their stores in the past 40 years and having the lowest amount of stores per capita in the country (even lower than Utah!) there is no doubt the current system is inconvenient. Quite simply, anything that doesn’t open hundreds, if not a couple thousand more locations will not provide convenience seen in other states, and is a Band-Aid at best. It is obvious the PLCB cannot begin to compete in this area because they can’t afford it based on their business model of having everything the same store everywhere. Don’t let them buffalo you: the PLCB chooses the number of stores to open, not the legislature; the number of stores is not enforced by the Almighty Liquor Code (with the exception of the number of stores allowed to be open on Sunday). So while the population has increased over the last four decades, the number of State Stores has decreased from over 750 to about 605 today. Just to reach the national average, Pennsylvania should have about four times that number. “Modernization” does not begin to answer that issue, with one proposal saying they want to put 400 sq. ft. “stores” inside other stores, which they are already allowed to do now, and have been for at least 30 years. What exactly does that do for the consumer that the same size private store (which they claim wouldn’t provide the selection) would, besides remove that business opportunity from the citizenry?

Service – Unlike other retail stores, if you don’t like the service you can’t go anywhere else. You are stuck with the same training, the same attitudes, the same level of passion. In the world of private stores, if you don’t like the service you can go somewhere else and reward them with your business. The stores with bad service will eventually fail, and if somebody else sees the opportunity another will open. In the private sector you will find stores with a sales staff of well-trained professionals along with stores whose sales staff can barely tie their shoes. You have the choice of what level you require. Same size fits all is not a tenet of retail, although it seems to be gospel for the PLCB. There are private stores who have sommeliers on staff. The whole of the PLCB, 600 retail stores and an entire state’s wholesale wine trade, doesn’t. To be fair, the PLCB does have a sommelier as a part-time consultant. One. Part time. For the entire state. The third largest retail wine buyer on the continent does not have a full-time top tier wine person. I can’t be the only one to think there is something wrong with the system that not only allows this, but doesn’t care.

Privatization does create winners and losers. The winners are the citizens who now have access to a free market; the losers are those who can’t adapt to the free market system. While no system is perfect, looking at the rest of the country it is easy to see which one is preferred by consumers and businesses whenever there is a choice.

TELL YOUR LEGISLATORS YOU WANT THAT CHOICE!

Let’s Kill Another Privatization Myth

Like the movie, some supporters of the State Store System will "say anything" to keep the PLCB jobs program and prevent the citizens from having the choice, selection, and service enjoyed in the majority of states.

The latest in their series of  "Look (at our) Interesting Example," or LIE as I like to call it, is that privatization will kill craft beer, micro-distilleries, and small wineries (you pick: one, two, or all) in Pennsylvania. 

Really? Consider:

1.       What state has the largest number of craft brewers?

2.       What state has the largest number of micro-distillers?

3.       What state has the largest number of small wineries?

4.       What do these states have in common?

Not hard to figure out that California is the answer to #3, but they also lead in #1 with 316 as of last year. Question two goes to the state best known for distilling, Kentucky, with 16 micro distillers as of 2013 and California is second with 14

Both California and Kentucky have private alcohol sales - retail and wholesale. So tell me again how privatization will kill off these businesses in PA?  I’ll wait while you make up something.
.....Right. Exactly.

My next article will prove that PA rural roads have nothing to do with DUI fatalities compared to our surrounding states. Another LIE that pops up a lot.

Ohranj - We got no stinking Ohranj.

I was contacted by a licensee about why there is no Stolichnaya Ohranj Vodka in Lackawanna county.  Being a bit skeptical I looked and saw that the PLCB lists 4 different bottles available. #7188 is a closeout and the system says there are 0 in the county which makes sense. The replacement for #7188 is #3060 which is shown to be in 2/3rds of all the stores in the state....unless you live in Lackawanna county which has 7 bottles listed for the entire county but the licensee says there isn't any. I called one of the stores and sure enough the inventory says they have 2 but the physical check says they don't.

Next up is #9562 which is a 1L size bottle that the PLCB purposely fucks the citizens of the state over by not having it available anywhere but the border stores that are designed to keep people from going out of state for better prices and selection.  Not having a outlet store Lackawanna county doesn't get these so the licensee is out of luck there. Lastly there is the 1.75L size #6906 which is shown to be in 280 stores unless you live in Lackawanna county where there is none. 

Now the PLCB went 158% or $66 million over budget to get this spiffy inventory system in place so orders could be processed better and inventory tracked. They use a socialist system where everything is centrally planned out of Harrisburg and the stores are told what they will be getting so it really isn't the stores fault the product isn't available it is the PLCB's.

I understand that stores run out of product but we are talking about all 13 stores in an entire county.  This would NEVER happen in a private system. Chalk yet another one up under the FAIL column for state control.

The Numbers Game

The latest news is that the  PLCB hired an acting executive director to oversee operations.  This is the same guy that oversaw storing extra wine in trailers in the summer as the Director of Supply Chain. Maybe if the board worked more than 21 days a year (2013) they wouldn’t need a $150K babysitter.

NEWS FLASH! The Board is going to work 22 mostly half days in 2014.  That will surely improve things.

On to the reason of the post today.  I heard The Numbers Game by Thievery Corporation on the radio and that got me thinking about the PLCB and their numbers. Somehow Thievery Corporation and PLCB just meshed….weird how that is.

In 2008 and 2011 the PLCB did a survey about border bleed and buyers habits.  Seems like that time should be coming around again.  This time I have a suggestion for them.  Drive to New Jersey, ask nicely of the store owner or manager of Joe Canal’s or Moore Brothers if you can survey the people in their parking lot and then survey all of the PA plates you want, I’m certain you won’t have any problem finding a few hundred or more any day of the week. Who knows, one might be mine.  Do the same in Delaware with Total Wine and in Maryland. This way you get people who are actually buying not just saying they are buying to a survey taker.

Take all that info and then compare it to all those zip codes you bother the crap out of consumers to collect, add up what they spent with all the other out of state receipts and then tell us how bad the border bleed is. Some of your workers are frothing at the mouth on the internet saying how many Canadians, New Yorkers, Ohioans, Marylanders and West Virginians are coming by the bus and ship load to buy here in PA.  You have the numbers so tell us.  

I think since you never have said a word about positive border bleed it really is inconsequential no matter how good you say the stores are or how much you think the prices are competitive.  I think it is so bad as to be embarrassing compared to what leaves PA which is why you have never done it.  Here is your chance to strike a blow for socialist liquor control.  Prove to us how good it is or tell us what we already know – that the people really don’t like or want the state store system and would rather buy from a free market store than a government controlled store.  Maybe the new guy can take this ball and run with it. Just don’t wait too long, you don’t have that much time left.

Privatization IS Modernization and NOW is the time.