State Eyeing Beer At Liquor Stores

Commissioner Mark Bodi has been working long and hard to modernize operations at the state liquor commission. But he freely admits that he and the Governor had some help in generating the idea to sell beer at highway liquor stores.

“Well, McKinsey & Company, in their review of the operation of the liquor commission, identified the sale of beer as a potentially significant revenue opportunity for the state. So we are proposing to sell beer in some of our large traffic locations. We would sell it some of our high-traffic locations, by the large packages. We would not sell it by the single bottle.”

And if all goes according to plan, some state stores state will sell than a 1000 cases a week -- for a gross the commission pegs at 38 million dollars a year. And McKinsey’s suggestions don’t stop with beer. Its confidential report also told Lynch that the state could net millions more through other changes. Some of these are already in the Governor’s budget, like opening up state-owned land that surrounds some highway stores to private development, and closing the Concord liquor warehouse. Some others aren’t; including selling tobacco; increasing the state beer tax; making wine and liquor more expensive in stores that are far from the state borders and cutting the wages of store clerks by 25%. According to Lynch administration spokesperson Pam Walsh, some of those ideas might yet become part of the state budget discussion.

“The estimates don’t reflect all of their recommendations.”

-But are there things in there that have been totally rejected?

“Just cigarettes. But the state runs a business and if we are going to run a business we have a responsibility to run it as well as we can. since it benefits our taxpayers.”

In the meantime, those who sell beer for a living are responding to the proposal in predictable ways. Beer wholesales like it.

"It’s clearly overdue. It makes sense, and quite frankly, I congratulate the commission for its forward thinking."

Clark Corson represents the state’s beer distributors.

Retailers, meanwhile, are skeptical. John Dumais is President of the NH Grocer's Association.

“I’ve told them outright that I’m concerned that they are misusing their valuable floor space for a less profitable item. They are trading liquor or wine for beer, a less profitable item. And then we are concerned that it’s taking away from local economies.”

The potential changes at the liquor commission will remain a topic of debate at the state house for some time. There are three separate proposals pending that deal with commission reforms, some of which those also appear in the state budget.