Budget bill gives break to small wineries
Associated Press COLUMBUS - A proposed amendment to the state's budget bill would allow operators of small wineries in Ohio to sell their wine by mail and to put their products in grocery stores without using a distributor.
The author of the amendment, Rep. Matt Dolan, R-Novelty, said, though, that it mistakenly includes a provision on brew pubs that will have to be deleted.
Dolan, the Ohio House finance chairman, said he sought suggestions from trade groups representing the beer and wine industries, but didn't know how a provision barring brew pubs from selling takeout bottles and sealed jugs of beer got written into the amendment.
"I was told it was ready to go and sent it out to the interested parties," Dolan said. "I hadn't even read it. I created my own problem."
Chris McKim, owner of Strongsville's Brew Kettle, where customers brew and bottle their own beer, called the provision a "death blow" to his business and other small brewers. "It's our bread and butter," said McKim, whose bottled-beer sales generate 60 percent of his restaurant's sales.
Although the Wholesale Beer & Wine Association opposes the direct sale of wine to consumers, spokesman Bob Tenenbaum said the association would support the measure, provided the brew pub provision is removed, because the amendment satisfies the law with minimal damage to regulations surrounding wine distribution.
Publication date: 04-23-2007