Tag Archives: initiative

Drinks, Food

Tracking Liquor Prices in Liquor Stores Large and Small

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A shelf at Metropolitan Market (Photo: MvB)

Since the beginning of privatized liquor sales in Washington last June—for the first time since Prohibition—the question on everyone’s lips has been: Where are the cheaper prices we were promised?

Remember stories like this? “The owners of Shanahan’s Pub in Vancouver say they fully support 1183, because it will mean they can buy liquor at cheaper prices, and pass those savings on to their customers,” reported KOIN TV in 2011.

Despite public approval for Initiative 1183 in the early days, there were those who disliked it from the beginning. “Like a lot of craft distillers, Kent Fleischmann, co-owner of Dry Fly Distilling in Spokane, will vote against I-1183. He worries that prices for Dry Fly’s vodka and gin could be driven much higher by retailer and distributor markups, plus new fees imposed by the initiative. He figures a 750-milliliter bottle of gin and vodka could rise from $29.95 to $40, a daunting prospect,” reported the Seattle Times.

Unfortunately for Fleischmann (and the liquor buyers of Washington) his prediction turned out to be correct. A 750-milliliter bottle of Dry Fly gin is now regularly priced $34.99 at the Metropolitan Market, or $44.99 with tax. In fairness, as Metropolitan shoppers know, the prices there tend to be a few dollars more than most places, but it’s clear that we have not entered the free-market promised land.

Still, another question remains: Do certain stores, large or small, chain or independent, sell liquor at better prices than others?

To find out, we compared the cheapest fifth of vodka, rum, tequila, gin, and whiskey at grocery and big box stores (for simplicity’s sake, we did not distinguish between Scotch, bourbon, etc., and instead just included the cheapest whiskey we could find—usually Canadian) at various outlets. Secondly, we conducted a price comparison of a fifth of Absolut, Bacardi, Jose Cuervo, Seagram’s, and Jack Daniel’s.

A chart of bargain-basement pricing (Sophie Pattison/The SunBreak)

For the lowest liquor prices, the brands range from well-known, bargain-basement vodkas such as Platinum ($10.99 at Metropolitan Market) and Burnett’s ($9.99 at Trader Joe’s and 8.99 at BevMo), to Trader Joe’s brands that we had never heard of before, such as Rebel Yell Whiskey ($11.99).

Total Wine & More boasts a brand called American Pride that beats the prices everywhere else in tequila ($6.99), gin ($4.99), and vodka ($4.99). The cheapest whiskey we found was Monarch Canadian ($7.49) at BevMo; the cheapest rum, Montego Bay ($5.49) at Trader Joe’s.

At Metropolitan Market, as savvy shoppers might expect, prices don’t go very low at all. The cheapest rum brand was Bacardi ($11.99) and the cheapest gin, Beefeater ($19.99).

A chart of famous names in liquor (Sophie Pattison/The SunBreak)
A chart of famous names in liquor (Sophie Pattison/The SunBreak)

The reason we include the lowest price for every variety of liquor is to help readers gauge which stores have, overall, the least expensive brands. We are absolutely not recommending these as quality liquors. While the brand name American Pride might suggest a certain downhome dignity, its price of $4.99 for a fifth of vodka does not instill great confidence in brand quality.

We selected a hard-drinking neighborhood, collecting prices from several Capitol Hill grocery stores as well as one independent Capitol Hill liquor store and two of the new superstores. So far as the grocery stores go, the prices only differ by a few dollars. The QFC “regular” prices would make this store one of the more expensive places, but with a QFC Advantage card their prices closely match the other grocery stores. The prices listed in the chart for Safeway are those available with a Safeway Club Card.

The one independent liquor store we checked out, Northwest Liquor & Wine on 12th Avenue, did have slightly more expensive prices than the grocery stores for the brand name liquors we compared. However, their cheapest liquors were quite competitive with the other stores, and they even had the cheapest gin (McCormick’s $6.99) out of all the Capitol Hill stores, tying with Safeway (Essex $6.99), and beaten only by rock-bottom American Pride.

Health, News, Politics

Finally! Taiwan’s Next Media Animation Blows Smoke at I-502

“Marijuana will be out-right legalized” is perhaps a slight over-estimation of the three ballot issues up for the public vote in Colorado, Oregon, and Washington State, which allow the possession of small amounts for personal use. Though Washington’s I-502 doesn’t get much attention from the intrepid Taiwan news service, it seems a bigger conclusion can be drawn from the animation.

Everyone be responsible stoners and don’t fall asleep behind the wheel, and hopefully we’ll end up with Oregon’s dream of uppity weed tourists, sampling herbal admixtures just as one would quaff a wine. I-502 actually does tackle the stoned-driver issue with a DUID scale, though the 5ng/mL whole blood THC concentration cut-off has been called into question by the opposition to the initiative. You’ve got till November 6 to take a few bong rips and make up your mind.

Business, News, Politics

Seattle Doesn’t Trust Costco to Hold Its Liquor

All this could be Costco's...then yours. (Actually, it's the bar at Still.) (Photo: MvB)

Publicola (natch) tips you off to the latest Elway poll on Initiative 1183 (aka “Costco’s liquor-privatization initiative”), which shows a full 50 percent in support of I-1183 statewide. But not so fast.

First, as Publicola cautions: “It’s worth noting, though, that most pundits say a measure needs to initially poll at around 60 percent so it has a cushion to withstand the inevitable negative campaigning of an election.”

And secondly, as the Seattlepi.com’s Chris Grygiel adds, 54 percent of Seattle respondents were opposed.

Predictably, law enforcement and religious groups have looked askance at a proposal whose success is based on increasing total liquor sales in Washington. They’ve been joined in this by the United Food and Commercial Workers union, which represents some 1,000 workers currently employed by the state in its liquor stores. (The UFCW argues, persuasively, that union employees running state liquor stores are more stringent about not selling alcohol to minors than private enterprises.)

I-1183 calls for the closure of state liquor stores and the liquor distribution center; private sellers would then be licensed, with the state still collecting a 17 percent vig from total liquor sales. To forestall corner booze emporia popping up, the initiative requires stores to have 10,000 square feet of retail space. But there’s no denying that the hope (or fear) is that greater convenience and “non-uniform wholesale pricing” would tend to increase liquor sales.

The state’s Office of Financial Management agrees, and offers this rosy prediction for a state beleaguered by deficit, should Washington adopt I-1183:

…total State General Fund revenues increase an estimated $216 million to $253 million and total local revenues increase an estimated $186 million to $227 million, after Liquor Control Board one-time and ongoing expenses, over six fiscal years. A one-time net state revenue gain of $28.4 million is estimated from sale of the state liquor distribution center.

So what’s Seattle’s problem? Democrats. We’re loaded with them, and 62 percent don’t seem to care for anything with “privatization” in the name. Seattle Republicans and independents, by contrast, are in favor 57 and 54 percent, respectively. It’s a little strange, in that initiative sponsor Costco is beloved by Democrats, at least those running for office. Maybe the emphasis should be on “de-socializing” liquor, instead?