Mar 25, 2008 11:02 am US/Eastern
Wegmans At Center Of Pa. Beer Battle
HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) ―
Wegmans Food Markets
Inc. won regulatory approval to sell beer at six Pennsylvania supermarkets, prompting a beer
distributors' association to ask a court Monday to overturn the decision.
Wegmans was issued liquor licenses on Wednesday
for its stores in Bethlehem, Dickson City,
Lower Nazareth, State College, Wilkes-Barre and Williamsport.
Pennsylvania's
liquor laws impose conditions for certain categories of licenses, such as
requiring food to be sold on the premises and minimum seating capacities, so—with
a few exceptions -- supermarkets have not sold beer.
But Wegmans' supermarkets have cafes that
qualify for "restaurant" licenses, allowing beer, wine and hard liquor to be sold
for consumption inside the eating establishment, and the equivalent of 12
16-ounce containers of beer for takeout.
Wegmans' lawyer R.J. O'Hara said the chain may
eventually sell wine for on-premises consumption but has no plans to sell
liquor.
He said the Malt Beverage
Distributors Association of Pennsylvania lawsuit filed in Commonwealth Court on Monday was
anticipated and may delay the start of beer sales.
"What Wegmans offers is a restaurant that
happens to be based in a grocery store," O'Hara said. "By no means is it a
grocery store selling beer."
He said the company had to make changes to
qualify for the licenses, including narrowing the passageway that connects the store
with the cafe. O'Hara said customers will have to pay for their beer inside the
cafe, not at normal checkout lanes with other grocery items.
The distributors' association said the PLCB
decision— technically six separate decisions, one for each store—was an abuse
of its discretion and violated beer sales rules that the Legislature has
passed.
"The LCB may want to update or modify or change
the way beer's sold in Pennsylvania,
but that's not its job," said Bob Hoffman, the lawyer for the beer distributors'
association. "That's a legislative job."
Rochester, N.Y.-based Wegmans also has
applications pending before the Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board for its
stores in Downingtown, Erie
and Mechanicsburg. The PLCB approved beer, wine and liquor sales at a Wegmans
in Erie on Feb.
13, but that approval was not part of the malt distributors' court action.
PLCB spokesman Nick Hays said at least two Pennsylvania grocery stores had previously obtained "beer-only"
licenses: a Weis in Tannersville and Vidalia Market in Lansdale.
Delis and other types of businesses hold the state's roughly 500 beer-only
licenses.
An appeal by Sheetz Inc. of the rejection of
its plan to sell takeout beer only at a convenience store in Altoona is scheduled for oral argument before
the state Supreme Court next month. A lower court said such sales were illegal,
because the license Sheetz obtained required at least some beer to be sold for on-premises
consumption as well.
(© 2009 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)
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