Sean Hughes, Account Director, Cronin & Hughes.

By Sean Hughes, Connecticut Package Stores Association

Here we sit a little more than a month into the new year, dealing with the same issues that have haunted the wine and spirits industry for close to four years now. The legislation to allow supermarkets the ability to sell wine has been a constant idea that has been pushed by grocery stores and others to see it signed into law. Thankfully through large-scale lobbying efforts by the wine and spirits industry, wine in grocery stores as a bill has not even made it to a vote in the General Law Committee.

The grassroots effort that the grocery stores have mounted is, to their credit, more impressive than their previous attempts to change the law over a decade ago. They have an operation website that informs visitors about what they are trying to accomplish and how they need the public’s support to contact their legislators. They have a QR code (a code that a person can scan on their phone that takes them to a website), which takes a person to their website so that they can input their information and be signed up to have their name and email sent in a generic form letter to legislators in the General Assembly.

The form letters were sent by the hundreds to certain legislators. Numerous legislators have reportedly received many letters from constituents, as well as Connecticut residents from outside their districts. In addition to this, they also have active social media accounts on all of the major sites. The public relations campaign they have, which goes by CT Wine Now, is even being advertised on major TV channels, as well as at the gas station pumps at certain retailers. The effort has also been featured on WFSB-TV to discuss how wine in grocery stores would be a benefit to the state.

I mention all of this to lay out what exactly is against the wine and spirits industry for the last four years. Each year, the campaign grows larger in the number of outlets that are reached. So, after reading all of this, it really puts into perspective the true volume, money and effort put in by the grocery stores. Despite the effort, the wine and liquor industry has been successful in blocking the bill each time it has been proposed. The work that goes into defeating a bill that has that much backing and money behind it is no easy task. The Connecticut Package Stores Association (CPSA) and the rest of the industry work year-round to protect the current liquor structure in Connecticut.

Unfortunately, other states have not had the same success that we in Connecticut have had in efforts against wine being sold in grocery stores. Tennessee—and, most recently, Colorado—has seen the liquor industry lose by witnessing the passage of wine in grocery stores, either by legislative action or ballot initiative that lets the voter chose.

The Hartford Courant recently published the article “2025 CT Legislative Session Starts Wednesday with Focus on Financial Relief for Residents.” The article focused on what are believed to be the main issues heading into the new session, which started on Jan. 8.

A quote from the Connecticut Food Association, which represents the grocery stores in the state, outlined what its plan was for the upcoming session. The goal is to create a “modernization task force” that will study the state’s liquor laws and see what compromises can be explored to allow for changes, essentially what can be given to package stores that would allow them to give the grocery stores the ability to sell wine. This task force has the ability to open the door to the entire liquor statutes.

The 2025 legislative session will be busy like they all are. Whether it is wine in grocery stores, allowing towns the ability to ban the sale of nips or allowing big-box stores to sell beer, the liquor statutes seem to always have crosshairs on them each session. CPSA is up in Hartford every day reading each bill and amendment. Some bills are a few hundred pages or only a few lines long, but it can take a few sentences in a bill to completely upend the current regulatory market. CPSA is fighting every day to ensure the current system stays in place. Belonging to CPSA is the cheapest insurance policy a store could ever buy.

Find out more about any of these issues and the benefits of membership at ctpsa.com.