The colonial legacy of Massachusetts is on display in British-style architecture around the Bay State — and even in the “r”-less Boston accent of some locals, with linguistic origins of their unique speaking style dating back to English settlers in the 17th century.
Some colonial-era rules remain on the books too — and not ones that locals generally like. “Blue law” remnants in state laws, hearkening back to Massachusetts’s days of Puritan rule, are aimed at limiting booze consumption.
Massachusetts’s alcohol sales rules have long drawn the ire of Bostonians and residents throughout the state. They’ve been whittled away over the years. A notable update came in 2003, when Republican Gov. Mitt Romney, a nondrinker as a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, signed legislation that legalized statewide liquor store sales on Sundays. (Romney would be the 2012 GOP presidential nominee and is now a senator from Utah.)
Now Massachusetts residents have the chance to ease alcohol sale restrictions further. A Nov. 8 ballot measure would expand the state’s tight statewide limits on the number of alcohol licenses one company can hold. The proposal, if approved, would pave the way for more places to sell beer and wine.
Question 3 would gradually increase the number of alcohol licenses a single company could hold from nine to 18, though only seven of those licenses would permit the sale of hard liquor, down from the current limit of nine.
The measure has been put forward as a compromise by package stores, affectionately known in the state as “packies.”
Massachusetts has an unusual system of alcohol regulation. Grocery stores and gas stations generally can’t sell beer, wine, or liquor. Instead, people go to packies, which are independently owned liquor stores licensed by the state, to get all kinds of beer.
Packies have fought efforts in previous years by food stores to remove the license cap altogether to offer alcohol at more chain stores, arguing that doing so would push them out of business.
The measure on the ballot this year is a compromise of sorts. Under it, food stores wouldn’t put forward their own ballot initiative to expand where liquor can be sold until 2028 because, per state law, any measure deemed too similar to a current one would be barred from appearing before voters for six years. Only state lawmakers could make any changes in the meantime.
The latest measure, if approved, would increase the number of alcohol licenses a company could hold to 12 in 2023, 15 in 2027, and 18 beginning in 2031, though only seven licenses could be for all liquors. Any company or retailer that holds nine all-liquor licenses would be grandfathered in.
The measure would also ban self-checkout sales for alcohol, requiring retailers to sell alcoholic beverages face-to-face. It also would revise how fines would be levied against a retailer found selling alcohol in violation of state laws. Instead of fines being based on gross alcohol sales, they would be calculated by the gross of all retail sales, which could place a larger financial burden on retailers selling more than alcohol.
The Massachusetts Package Store Association contends package store owners felt like they needed to offer some sort of solution to allow more food stores to sell wine and beer while limiting the expansion of liquor sales. That’s where many package stores earn most of their business.
Campaign spending increasing
The measure has not seen much opposition financially until this month when a local subsidiary of Total Wine & More reported spending $2.1 million against the measure and released a television advertisement. Several food industry groups have also voiced their opposition, including the Massachusetts Food Association, Cumberland Farms, and the Retailers Association of Massachusetts, arguing that the new fine system would disproportionately affect them.
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Total Wine & More is taking an active interest in 2022 ballot measures on alcohol sales. Rep. David Trone (D-MD), the founder and co-owner of Total Wine & More with his brother, Robert Trone, is bankrolling a Colorado Nov. 8 ballot measure that would eventually allow liquor retailers to operate an unlimited number of locations in the Centennial State. Total Wine & More has three stores in Colorado, which is the maximum now allowed.
The Trone brothers have spent more than $2.6 million in support of Colorado’s Initiative 96, per filings from the secretary of state’s office.
