Pennsylvania Licensed Beverage and Tavern Association Archives

Bill to aid family-owned bars, taverns, restaurants leaves committee

Proponents of a House Bill leaving committee hope it might serve as the solution to rising costs for Pennsylvania’s restaurants and bars, according to the Pennsylvania Licensed Beverage and Tavern Association.

The Pennsylvania Licensed Beverage and Tavern Association (PLBTA) issued a statement supporting the Pennsylvania House Liquor Control Committee’s voted Tuesday to move House Bill 1160 out of committee.

The vote was unanimously in favor of the measure, whose primary sponsor is Rep. Napoleon Nelson, D-Montgomery. The bill is seen by proponents as aiding the state’s family-owned bars, taverns, and licensed restaurants as they seek to recover from restrictions placed upon them during the pandemic.

Under Rep. Nelson’s bill, liquor licensees would be able to hold an unlimited number of off-premises catering events beyond 2024. Act 87 of 2021 sunsets at the end of 2024, and if allowed to sunset, the state would revert back to liquor codes limiting the number of off-premises catering events.

HB1160 would remove the sunset date.

Nelson said that while the pandemic emergency is lessening, many Pennsylvania restaurants and bars continue to struggle.

“New hurdles have appeared with raising costs due to inflation and supply chain issues along with labor shortages,” Nelson said in a statement. “We need to do all we can to help these businesses adapt and remain flexible.”

Chuck Moran, executive director of the PLBTA, said the organization fully supports Nelson’s bill.

“The past decade has been a financially difficult one for family-owned taverns, bars, and licensed restaurants,” said Moran. “First, the industry lost the exclusive right to sell six-packs to go, resulting in significant loss of revenue. This was followed by pandemic restrictions that closed indoor dining. Then recovery efforts were hampered by supply chain issues, inflation, and a lack of workers.

“Each of these have acted as a gut punch to drinking establishments statewide. The time has come to give these small businesses hope that they can prosper and make it on their own in the future.”

A cold beer may be hard to come by at local bars, taverns and restaurants

Close up of bartender pouring draft beer in glass

The availability of beer at bars, taverns and restaurants in the southeast is becoming a slow flow as supply chain issues hit distributors.

According to the Pennsylvania Licensed Beverage and Tavern Association (PLBTA), distributors have been forced to limit deliveries due to a lack of drivers.

While reports have filtered in from various parts of the state including the southeast and northwest, the Pennsylvania Licensed Beverage and Tavern Association (PLBTA) says the epicenter appears to be in the southcentral section, where with little warning, Ace Beer Distributors (Universal Products, Inc.), Wrightsville, informed bars, taverns and clubs that they were cutting back deliveries to only twice per month.

On their website, Ace describes itself as representing “more than 350 brands (more than 2,000 products distributed!) from over 130 supplier partners and services over 1,400 direct retail partners across Lancaster, York, Adams, Franklin, Fulton, Cumberland, Dauphin, Lebanon, Perry, Mifflin, and Juniata counties.”

According to sources sharing information with the PLBTA, a labor crisis is to blame, specifically a lack of drivers.

In a recent letter to the Pennsylvania House Liquor Control Committee and the Pennsylvania Senate Law & Justice Committee, Chuck Moran, executive director of the PLBTA, told committee chairs that “the decision by Ace is quite problematic for small businesses that rely on the wholesaler.” Moran continued by writing, “Many family-owned taverns and bars do not have enough storage space to handle two or three weeks of malt beverage supplies.”

One club licensee recently wrote to the Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board with concerns about Ace’s delivery decision. The PLCB responded that the club could not pick up their own supplies, and they could not go out of a wholesaler’s territory to attempt to purchase supplies.

The only options offered were to attempt to get a delivery from a smaller distributor (if they would even do so) within the wholesaler’s territory or swap out popular more affordable national brands with local brands from breweries that deliver.

But delivery problems are not new. Before the pandemic, there were similar issues to a lesser degree; however, now those problems are being amplified.

A statewide membership survey conducted by the Pennsylvania Licensed Beverage and Tavern Association in 2019 showed that nearly 40% of PLBTA members surveyed had fewer delivery date options and nearly 20% had experienced delayed delivery of malt beverages from distributors. And more than one out of three members had run out of certain malt beverages and had to wait for a resupply.

Further complicating the issue are outdated liquor laws. By law, bar owners can only receive beer delivered from retail and importing distributors and can’t pick it up themselves, Moran said.

While licensed bars, taverns and clubs can purchase liquors at a state store and personally deliver the supply to their bar or tavern, current law does not allow them to pick up and personally deliver malt beverages to their own establishment.

“In late 2019, we suggested a reasonable business solution to this problem, proposing legislation that would allow R, H, E, and club licensees to pick up a limited ‘emergency’ supply of beverages from the wholesaler or distributor and then deliver that supply to their own establishment when the wholesaler was unable to make a timely delivery,” Moran wrote in his letter to the legislative committees that oversee industry-related matters.

For now, Moran says his association hopes the legislature as well as distributors will listen to these concerns and help build business solutions.

Pa. Licensed Beverage and Tavern Association looking for answers to liquor privatization

The Pennsylvania Licensed Beverage and Tavern Association (PLBTA) members want answers to how House Bill 2272 will impact their business before throwing support behind it.

The bill, sponsored by Rep. Natalie Mihalek, R-Allegheny, intends to privatize liquor sales and get Pennsylvania out of the liquor business.

Chuck Moran, executive director of PBLTA, said privatization of Pennsylvania’s liquor business may be a good idea, but the statewide association representing licensed family-owned bars, taverns and restaurants has questions about how the State House bill could impact their businesses and their customers before they can support such a change.

Because of those questions, the PLBTA is taking no position on the bill but instead is offering to help plan for privatization so that small businesses don’t suffer unintended consequences if the legislation and constitutional amendment pass.

Tavern and restaurant owners are concerned that the proposal is too simple for a complex state liquor system. The main text of the bill reads, “The Commonwealth shall not manufacture or sell at wholesale or retail, liquor.” Beyond that, the bill gives the state 18 months to get out of the liquor sales business, he said.

The PLBTA Board of Directors recently agreed that the state should not be in the wholesale and retail liquor businesses, but said it is critical that, if the state does exit liquor sales, it be done in a way that protects small business taverns and licensed restaurants and their customers through meaningful protections and liquor code changes.

A major concern, Moran said, is what comes next as large well-funded players start working to rewrite liquor code. “While our lobby is active, it is small compared to many … and tiny compared to the major players (think Amazon, Walmart, Costco).

Historically, when a small business walks into a state store to pick up their liquor supplies, they’re paying the exact same price as the large chains no matter how much is bought. It allows the small business to sell at the same price/profit margin as a large chain.

“Like we see with malt beverages, we anticipate the large players getting incredible cost breaks that would allow them to sell drinks cheaper. My average member’s business is about 63% the sale of alcohol, and 37% food sales. So, they rely heavily on the sale of alcohol,” Moran said.

“Our Members have really taken a number of gut punches in recent years between Acts 39 and 166 of 2016 followed up by COVID mitigation orders, variants, supply chain issues, and workforce problems,” he said. “The last thing any family-owned tavern or restaurant needs now is a change in the system that puts these small businesses at yet another disadvantage at a time when they are already struggling to recover and stay open.”

Acts 39 and 166 hurt restaurants to the tune of hundreds of thousands of dollars when they lost the exclusive right to sell six-packs to go, according to the PBLTA. “Today, a beer distributor can sell at any level … growler to keg. Gas stations and grocery stores got into the business of selling six packs too. It was significant competitive intrusion for small businesses,” Moran said.

The PLBTA said a privatization effort should address problematic and antiquated liquor codes and should be done with the public understanding that that small business taverns and restaurants and their customers will benefit with a different wholesale and retail arrangement.

Moran said his members in philosophy favor privatization but are concerned that without meaningful protections for small businesses, privatization could place them at a disadvantage compared to large multi-state chains.

“We anticipate well-funded, major players including those from out-of-state would view HB 2272 passage as an opportunity to have a ‘redo’ of the liquor code,” he said. “As such, beyond privatizing wholesale and retail sales, the eventual privatization plan could impact all phases of liquor control, licensing, and supply.”

Customer convenience is also an issue for the PLBTA, as it has been seeking various customer related changes already, including increased discounts, cocktails-to-go and modernization of Happy Hour regulations.

Tavern association applauds state house passage of two bills that will help bars and restaurants

After a year of devastating COVID-19 restrictions, the Pennsylvania Licensed Beverage and Tavern Association said it is pleased to see the state legislature moving forward with two bills that would help bars and restaurants.

The state House of Representatives passed HB 425 and HB 427 with votes of 201-0.

HB 427, sponsored by now-retired Rep. Jeff Pyle, R-Kittanning, would increase the discount bars and restaurants get on liquor products from 10% to 15% for the next three years.

Chuck Moran, executive director of the association, said the bill was a priority in PLBTA’s industry recovery plans.

HB 425, sponsored by Rep. Matthew Dowling, R-Harrisburg, would allow a licensee that is either closed for a long period of time, or permanently to sell their liquor or wine to another licensee. Moran said the bill would help establishments that didn’t survive the COVID-19 crisis.

“It has been widely recognized that the tavern and restaurant industry has been one of the hardest hit during the pandemic, and has been in survival mode since March 2020,” Moran said in a release. “Now, with the continued success of the vaccine rollout, and mitigation orders being safely eased, there does appear to be a light at the end of the tunnel.”

Both bills now head to the State Senate.

PLCB votes to waive 2021 liquor license fees

The Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board voted today to waive most liquor licensing fees for 2021, a move that the Pennsylvania Licensed Beverage and Tavern Association is calling it a step in the right direction.

To ease some of the financial burden on the bar and restaurant industry, which has been among the hardest hit by the COVID-19 pandemic, the board voted 2-1 to forgive approximately $27.7 million in license fees next year.

Chuck Moran, executive director of the PLBTA said the waiver was something the association has been requesting as part of a larger industry survival and recovery package. However, he said, the impact of the fee waiver would not be significant.

“While waiving certain licensing fees won’t bring that much financial relief, it is a matter of principle to help those who are able to survive until then,” he said.

He called the fee waiver one piece of the puzzle for the industry’s recovery.

“Clearly, more needs to be done to help small business taverns and licensed restaurants that have sacrificed the most of any industry during this pandemic. They have been the tip of the spear in this battle since day one, and have played an important role to first flatten the curve and later getting school children back in class,” he said.

The board said license and permit fees for such things as renewal fees and amusement permits and Sunday sales permits, which range from $30 to $700 each, are among those waived.

So are safekeeping extension fees, which start at $5,000 or $10,000 per year depending on the county. Those allow a licensee to preserve an inactive license beyond two years.

The board noted that while these license fees will be waived through 2021, licensees will still be required to timely file validation and renewal applications to keep licensees current and to avoid late-filing fees. The PLCB also said that it will require licensees to file all documents and pay all fees necessary to bring their license up to date for 2020 by Dec. 31.

License fees that will continue to be collected in 2021 include those associated with wine expanded permit applications and renewals, direct wine shipper licenses, change of ownership and/or location of a license, application fees for new licenses, fees associated with a licensee’s change of officers/managers and extension of licensed premises.

The board noted that certain businesses less impacted by COVID-19 restrictions, including manufacturers, beer distributors and transporters for hire will still be required to pay license fees in 2021.

Board member Mike Negra was the lone no vote for the waiver. He did not support the waiver because he felt the board did not have the authority to waive fees.

“This fee waiver is the equivalent of the PLCB legislating, rather than administering current law, and legislating is the role of the Pennsylvania Senate, House and Governor,” he said.

Restaurant industry hails senate vote easing COVID-19 restrictions

The battle over COVID-19 restaurant rules isn’t over.

The Pennsylvania Senate voted 43-6 Tuesday in favor of House Bill 2513, which would ease the state’s mitigation efforts for establishments with liquor licenses.

The bill mostly reverts to rules that were in place before stricter rules were enacted July 15 in the wake of a spike in COVID-19 cases as well as well as new regulations that were enacted Monday.

The bill would strip away measures that ban bar seating, tie alcohol sales to meals and would eliminate the Governor’s self-certification program. In its current form the ban on the sale of alcoholic beverages after 11 p.m., which began Monday, would stay in place.

The original 50% seating capacity, mask wearing rules, social distancing and other sanitation requirements of the original orders would also be maintained.

The state House of Representatives still needs to vote on concurrence, but representatives of the industry are calling it a step in the right direction.

“HB 2513 is a safe step in the right direction. It takes into consideration a balance of COVID safety measures and business survival needs,” said Chuck Moran, executive director of the Pennsylvania Licensed Beverage and Tavern Association. “The industry has played and continues to play its role in the COVID-19 battle. It has been the tip of the spear since day one of the battle, and has sacrificed the most of any industry. Industry casualties are mounting as more establishments close their doors and employees lose their jobs. The industry and its employees desperately need this type of help.”

Harrisburg Restaurateur, Jen Fertenbaugh, co-owner of Café Fresco Center City and Level 2 also thanked senators for the bi-partisan support of the bill.

“This measure is a reasonable compromise. It’s a step forward to get us back on track, preserves public health and the potential for our bars and restaurants to weather this pandemic while researchers find a vaccine,” She said.
If the house concurs the bill would head to the governor’s desk.

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Tag: Pennsylvania Licensed Beverage and Tavern Association

Bill to aid family-owned bars, taverns, restaurants leaves committee

Tavern association applauds state house passage of two bills that will help bars and restaurants

PLCB votes to waive 2021 liquor license fees

Restaurant industry hails senate vote easing COVID-19 restrictions