With Illinois lawmakers back to work in a lame-duck session, one of the issues at the top of their to-do list is getting Illinois’ act together when it comes to home delivery of beer, wine and spirits.
According to a piece at Patch.com, the Illinois House Executive Committee forwarded a bill dealing with home delivery of alcohol to the floor of the House on Friday. It seems the overall problem that our state lawmakers have had in putting things together for home booze delivery is uniformity in laws throughout the state.
If enacted, the bill would make the rules guiding home delivery of alcohol uniform across the state, and create a third-party facilitator license. Alec Laird, Vice President of government relations with the Illinois Retail Merchants Association, said home delivery has exploded amid the pandemic. “This is something that helps your mom-and-pop retailers and your consumers” said Laird.
As to the reference of liquor home delivery exploding during (and because of) the pandemic, I did a little digging to see what other states are doing about getting beer, wine, and spirits to the front doors of folks who would prefer to have their booze delivered rather than going out to pick it up.
ConsumerChoiceCenter.org says that right now, we’ve got 12 states that allow all liquor (and by all, I mean beer, wine, and spirits) to be delivered to homes, and 31 states (including Illinois) that are okay with beer and wine delivery. Alabama, Arkansas, Delaware, Mississippi, Oklahoma, Rhode Island, and Utah still have home delivery bans in place for all three.
The Patch.com piece also points out that the Illinois Craft Brewers Guild is not happy about the Illinois bill, as they say small craft brewers are being left out.
Danielle D’Alessandro, Executive Director of the Illinois Craft Brewers Guild:
This is the second liquor delivery bill now that excludes the ability of small brewers and distillers to be able to deliver and ship to consumers in Illinois.
Illinois’ lame-duck legislative session lasts through Wednesday, so we’ll be keeping an eye on where the debate goes on home liquor delivery in Illinois.
Originally published here.
