Archive for the ‘Byrd v Tennessee’ Category
The wine industry in America is a trailing indicator of the culture and economy. It always has been. The top stories in wine in 2019 reflect this truism. Politics, powerful social movements, the economy, evolving modes of consumerism and natural disasters all came together to give us the industry’s biggest stories in 2019. These are those stories. Supreme Court Pushes Back on Protectionism Fourteen years ago the U.S. Supreme Court rendered an opinion in Granholm v Heald that created the…
“It’s an opportunity for consumers, and that’s the most important thing. Whatever’s best for the customer is going to be best for us in the end.” These are the wise words of Belinda Weber, Duckhorn Wine Company Marketing Director, in a Napa Valley Register article that explored the impact of June’s Tennessee Wine v Thomas Supreme Court decision and its real potential to result in more states changing their laws to allow wine shipments from out-of-state wine retailers. But, the…
There is a dynamic currently in play among America’s alcohol regulators and the alcohol community as a whole that threatens Wineries’ direct-to-consumer shipping rights. Over the past month, I’ve sat through two conferences aimed at educating America’s alcohol regulatory community, its attorneys and the leadership of the three tiers. I attended the Center for Alcohol Policy’s Legal Conference in Boston and most recently the National Conference of State Liquor Administrator’s Central/Western Conference in Boston. At both conferences, there was a…
Reciprocity! It’s a word associated with the concept of direct to consumer wine shipments that has not been bandied about for some time. But it turns out that there is a selection of states that still require reciprocal wine shipping agreements. It also turns out reciprocal wine shipping laws are unconstitutional. As a reminder, “Reciprocal” wine shipping laws are those in which State #1 passes a law allowing wineries or retailers in other states to ship in so long as…
There is a political spectrum within the alcohol industry. However, it’s not much like the ideological extremes of American political culture. The American polity is divided; polarized in a way I can’t recall before. It’s as though the electorate will root for their team, no matter how absurd or radical the deeds, desires or words attributed to the leadership of their tribe. The middle of the American political spectrum is a wasteland—a bowed middle and top-heavy on the ends. While…
