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New year ends minibottle era
But big bottles' reign will start slow, on a Sunday
HENRY EICHEL
heichel@charlotteobserver.com
COLUMBIA - The minibottle's reign over the bars of South Carolina ends at the stroke of midnight New Year's Eve. But don't expect to see booze begin pouring from big bottles right away.
Because New Year's Day is a Sunday this year, most of the state, including York and Lancaster counties, will have last call about 11:50 p.m.
"If it had fallen on a different day, like a Friday, we could have poured our first free-pour drink at 12:01; it would have been neat," said Danny Holmes, owner of Towne Tavern in Fort Mill.
But even in Columbia, Myrtle Beach and other localities with a local option on Sunday mixed-drink sales, food and beverage industry sources say not much is going to change on Jan. 1, 2006, when the new state liquor law becomes effective.
"I don't think you'll see very many bars immediately going out and start cracking big bottles," said S.C. Hospitality Association president Tom Sponseller. "They've got an inventory of little bottles they've got to get rid of first, and the only way they can get rid of them is to sell them."
Signed in June by Gov. Mark Sanford, the new law allows bars to pour drinks from big bottles. Voters asked for the change in 2004 when they approved a state constitutional amendment that ended the requirement that bars serve booze only from containers of less than 2 ounces. South Carolina was the only state that served liquor only from minibottles.
Lake Wylie liquor dealer Vince Mugavero, who sells wholesale to about 80 York County bars and restaurants, said of the establishments that plan to switch to big bottles: "They're not all that concerned about that first day, as long as they get it the first week or so."
However, Towne Tavern's Holmes said he will be free-pouring when the sports bar reopens at 10:30 a.m. Monday. He said, "We will have leftover inventory, but we'll be able to get it to another bar owner who's staying with minis."
He said New Year's Day will actually be a valuable day off. "We'll be able to clear out our inventory, we'll change the way the bar is situated, and we've got to make some changes in our computer" to allow for different drink prices and a new 5 percent sales tax on mixed drinks that will replace the old tax of 25 cents per minibottle.
Liquor dealer Mugavero said that although major chain restaurants and the busier independents will dump the minibottles as fast as they can, "The little guys are going to resist, because they don't sell all that much, and because they say their customers want the stronger drink."
The mini's 1.7-ounce pour is stronger than what you get from most bartenders across the nation, including in North Carolina, where the standard is 1.25 ounces. Because of that, people who want to crack down on drunken driving formed an unusual coalition with bar owners who don't like minibottles because they're a nuisance -- and less profitable than pouring from big bottles.
The minis have lined S.C. bar shelves since March 28, 1973, the day the first legal mixed drink in modern S.C. history was poured in a hotel bar in Columbia. They were originally embraced as "a civilized approach to moderation," compared with the former requirement that made people tote their own liquor into restaurants in paper sacks. Advocates of legalizing mixed drinks said minibottles, because they made drinking expensive, were the only way that anti-liquor forces would accept changing the law.
Contact Henry Eichel: (803) 255-1388
