Posted 5 months, 7 days ago in 
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It seems fairly certain that the “blue law” prohibiting liquor stores from being open on Sundays will be repealed. As the owner of a small liquor store, I shall choose to keep my doors closed. Sunday is my day off, as it is for the majority of liquor store owners. One of the arguments being used for opening liquor stores on Sundays is that $6 million in annual sales tax revenue will be generated for the state of Colorado. I find this ludicrous.
To generate that amount, liquor stores would have to add almost $207 million in additional sales during those 52 days, or over $4 million in sales each and every Sunday. Keep in mind that these sales would be over and above the existing sales during the six days of the week we are currently open.
The reality is that the majority of sales on Sundays would just replace sales that would otherwise occur on Fridays and Saturdays. I would encourage our legislators to not count on this windfall when considering budgets and spending because it will never happen.
Passage of this bill will only bolster the efforts of supermarkets to push for legislation allowing them to sell full-strength beer and wine (and perhaps liquor) as it will obviously hurt their sales of 3.2 percent beer on Sundays. I don’t want to go there.
Frankly, my opinion is that if the consumer can’t buy their alcoholic beverages between Monday and Saturday, then they have larger issues they need to address. Meanwhile, you can continue to find me at home on Sundays catching up with my family, doing chores, and taking a well-deserved nap.
DAN LAWRIE
Hilltop Liquors
Grand Junction
4 Responses to “Sunday liquor sales won’t help state’s bottom line”
Posted March 3rd, 2008 at 12:25 pm Login to Send PM Report this comment
So, if a locally owned gas station chooses to close on Sunday, and another one, owned by a corporation, chooses to stay open on Sundays, and customers go to the corporate station to spend their money on Sunday, that’s whose fault, exactly?
Liqour stores have been using the outdated Blue Laws to give themselves a day off without fear of real competition. Now that those days are over, they’re getting petulant.
It’s not the public’s responsibility to give you a day off, is it? You take it at your own risk. If you’re in a sales business, a day that your doors are closed is a day that you lose money. You’ve just been coasting so long, you’ve forgotten that.
And I find it odd, and a little insulting, that you’d take pot-shots at your core customer base. Non-drinkers are non-liquor store patrons. Who are you serving, then? You must sell a LOT of ice and cigarettes. But, I suppose, now they’ll be able to go somewhere else to get their booze on Sundays. If you’re not open, it won’t be your problem, will it?
You wanna take Sunday off? (Ever hear of a part-time employee? No? Maybe you should look it up.) That’s fine. You have that right. Your customers who have “larger issues to address” have the right to spend their money somewhere else. And soon, enough, they will.
Stay Tuned: Next up - Dan will tell us how Alcohol-related deaths will skyrocket…..
Posted March 3rd, 2008 at 3:06 pm Login to Send PM Report this comment
Correct on all counts except for the last paragraph. People do sometimes find themselves in need of liquor, wine or beer on Sunday’s and, heaven forbid, they didn’t plan ahead only to find themselves short or without. The issue is “why should any business try to legislate advantageous hours for themselves at the expense of their customers convenience”? Mr.Lawrie might occasionally lose a customer or two on a one-time basis if he has generated a loyal following. If he treats his customers as “his” to treat any way he chooses he may lose many more to someone who stays open and shows he values consumer convenience. Try it out your way, Mr. Lawrie. It may work out well. If you have a following of good customers you may find out what they think you think of their interests. Possibly to your detriment
Posted March 3rd, 2008 at 7:42 pm Login to Send PM Report this comment
I was very happy to see our state take a small step away from socialism by legalizing liquor sales on Sunday. What business does the state have in deciding when and where we can sell anything? It doesn’t favor any of us to have a few elected officials deciding when adults can buy alcohol and laws should never be created to give anyone an advantage over anyone else. Let’s stick to the free market that gave us our fantastic prosperity in the first place!
Posted March 4th, 2008 at 10:20 am Login to Send PM Report this comment
I’m not 100% sure if they are repealing ALL of the blue laws but if they are, lets not forget that they prohibit the sale of anything with a title as well. SO Mr. Lawrie, maybe this is where some of the “$207 million in additional sales” as you put it, will be coming from, not just liquer stores. and if you insist on staying closed on sundays, i imagine hilltop liquers will be closed from lack of business within 2 years of this law being repealed.
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