Comments on: Put “at rest” to rest in NY

By: The "at rest" bill threatens the diversity of wine in NYC | Dr Vino's wine blog

Mon, 08 Apr 2013 12:40:27 +0000

[...] New York Post had a story yesterday about a scary bill that has reappeared in Albany that has parallels for wine enthusiasts to the amazon warehouse. The story reports that [...]

By: ed

ed — Mon, 02 Apr 2012 23:49:09 +0000

I live on long island,I have a small liquor store down the road from me and about a 15 min ride to a discount liq store. I am a big believer in supporting the small stores to help keep them in business. So again with the whole at rest its not about getting rid of small businesses like ppl have said we were trying to do. I hope ppl understand that

By: Daniel Posner

Daniel Posner — Mon, 02 Apr 2012 23:43:52 +0000

Yup, it seems to be the American Way.

How many small liquor store owners do their grocery shopping at Costco?

How many of them fill their prescriptions at CVS?

We live in a great world of hypocrisy.

By: ed

ed — Mon, 02 Apr 2012 23:35:28 +0000

Unfortunately we all know a major reason all these small businesses going out is the high rents that they can no longer afford with the BIG liquor stores selling the same bottle at a cheaper price because they buy in bulk.

By: Daniel Posner

Daniel Posner — Mon, 02 Apr 2012 23:30:30 +0000

Again, I am happy to inform you of the facts. Small liquor and wine stores are already going out of business in NY.

30 years ago, there were 4500 liquor licences in New York State. Today, there are about 1800, I believe…60% drop.

The liquor stores that asked you to help are part of the same fossil collection that I speak of.

Liquor stores can adapt to life with wine in grocery stores.

35 states allow grocery stores to sell wine.

I wish consumers, all over the country, could buy wine from any wine merchant that they want.

Why does it need to be so difficult to buy a btl of wine?

By: ed

ed — Mon, 02 Apr 2012 00:21:18 +0000

@harmon. Actually the men that are delivering the liquor from jersey are NOT teamster brothers. They are reg guys with a cdl license. Now don’t get me wrong here I’ve been on this job for 12 years now and have made many friends with them. And they ALL wish they were a teamster and they also wish they didn’t go out with 45-50 stops alone. And the ones who do go out 2 and 3 men to a truck pay there helpers out of their own pocker
@Daniel just to touch quickly question for you. Do you not think if wines came into grocery stores if would not put the small little stores selling liq and wine out of business? To us drivers we would still have a delovery to make whether it be to a liquor store OR supermarket but YES we did fight that as the liq stores asked for help with that one. And as for my truck I deliver with I have a refridge box. Most of the trucks do have them. Not all but most of them. And yes I won’t lie 7 years I did sweat my ass off in the back of the truck.

By: Daniel Posner

Daniel Posner — Mon, 02 Apr 2012 00:02:08 +0000

I think we would get along just fine.

1) If there was a law, do you think the new applicant would file for a new store, if such a law existed?

This business is full of lies and manipulation. You are correct, the small wholesalers started the lies, by claiming that small wholesalers would go out of business. As folks like Harmon can attest to, I told them that they played that card all wrong. Of course, large wholesalers continued the lies.

I am not sure why we cannot just speak the truth and play the cards that we are dealt.

At Rest is dumb. Stupid law. It serves absolutely no valuable purpose.

Just like fighting wines in grocery stores. Just like primary source laws.

This industry is full of dinosaurs, holding onto something that they do not deserve.

Most of the “theys” are wholesalers.

Ed,

How hot does that back of your truck get in summmer time. How much wine are you cooking in a 95 degree day in August?

Let’s do lunch. Harmonk Skurnik is buying.

By: Harmon Skurnik

Harmon Skurnik — Sun, 01 Apr 2012 21:41:04 +0000

Dear Ed Teamster:
I’m sorry but I think that your employers and union heads are spreading falsehoods about this situation. Suggesting that the smaller wholesalers in the state do not pay taxes because they warehouse in NJ is just plain untrue – and it hurts your argument when people realize these are 100% false accusations: The fact is that ALL NY licensed wholesalers MUST be a New York entity with offices in the state of New York by law. We all employ thousands of New Yorkers, pay New York income taxes, New York revenue taxes on our sales, and excise tax to New York on every shipment regardless of whether the truck leaves a warehouse in NY or NJ that morning. The facts are that we are certainly NOT “slipping ANYTHING in under the radar” and we pay all of the SAME taxes, wages and everything that the big boys do.
Thankfully, the NY budget seems to have recently been passed without the “at rest” measure in it. But I hope that you seek out the facts, Ed, and come to understand the truth that this was an attempted “power grab” by the big wholesalers, who I assume convinced union members like you to support it. Incidentally, I doubt many of your NJ Teamster brethren would support it as they would stand to lose jobs!
Anyway, thanks for listening and I hope we can see eye to eye on this someday.
HS

By: ed

ed — Sun, 01 Apr 2012 21:17:19 +0000

Well on my route in manhattan I’ve seen many stores team together to keep a new one opening. According to them(not me)its a certain distance they have to be. So I had believed that’s what it was. Either way I read what you write of how our jobs aren’t at risk but its the same way as small businesses aren’t at risk if the “at rest” did pass. The two ny companies aren’t gonna raise the prices up on merchandise to the point of putting lil companies out of business as stated in previous posts. Why would they want to put their own customers out of business? See it just doesn’t make sense does it? Its the point of keeping our jobs secure. Same way we fought and won to have the beer companies stop delivering wine and liquor but that’s a whole different story.

By: Daniel Posner

Daniel Posner — Sun, 01 Apr 2012 21:03:41 +0000

I appreciate the reply, but you must get your facts straight. The SLA has no law, to my knowledge, about how far apart a liquor store might be from another. The “local liquor stores” do not “all get together” in the manner in which you describe. I have received about 6 notices of new stores coming nearby me. I have not ganged up on one. I moved my store 4 years ago, and just one store refuted my move. Thank goodness the SLA saw past the “we will go out of business” crap that that one store tried to pull.

We are not dinosaurs, so I urge you stop acting like one. You seem to be reasonably intelligent and I appreciate you joining the discussion, but your job is not at risk if at rest remains dormant as it should. The company that you work for is in NY and content to be so.

I just wish this industry could move forward. It is quite depressing to see these pointless discussions.

By: ed

ed — Sun, 01 Apr 2012 19:34:26 +0000

Daniel

This isn’t the first time nor will it be the last time we go up fighting. And let me be the first to say NOBODY wants to see the little businesses go out of business. Every liquor store or restaurant is a valued customer to both NY delivery companies,but we also have to protect our jobs. From both companies we have seen wine distributors pull out of ny and go to jersey because they get away with not payíng the ny taxes. Nobody wants to have their jobs threatend,the same way no liquor store wants to see another liquor store open up close to them. That’s why the sla has that law about how far a liquor store can open up from another one. And when one does try to sneak in the local liquor stores all get together and fight to stop it from happening. The same way we are fighting to stop more wine companies from going to jersey

By: Daniel Posner

Daniel Posner — Sat, 31 Mar 2012 19:32:46 +0000

Stupid laws in one state do not justify passing stupid laws in another.

Perhaps, your next rally should be in Hartford or Trenton and try to reverse the at rest laws that were passed there, over 100 years ago.

Let’s move into the 21st century. Not the 19th.

By: MarcP

MarcP — Sat, 31 Mar 2012 16:11:23 +0000

Your looking to ADD outdated prohibition era laws created as a means to level the playing field. From the wine industries vantage, we are getting drawn and quartered in the process. The correct direction is to remove at rest from the surrounding states to stop restricting our distribution options. Frankly, if that were to happen, not much would change since warehousing costs would be higher in NY due to limited real estate to be properly located. As I support unions, they can play politics as well as anyone else. By virtue of, if at rest laws were removed in all states most distributors would find no benefit from warehousing in NY geographically anyway. So in this instance I can not support the unions push for at rest

By: ed

ed — Sat, 31 Mar 2012 13:49:41 +0000

I am a driver for the local917 teamsters who was up at the albany rally. They are NOT trying to push out the little businesses BUT what some of you don’t know is the NJ,CT and places outside of ny can deliver to NY but NY CAN NOT deliver to any of those places. By letting those outside places deliver to into ny the city first of all is losing BILLIONS of dollars in taxes and these out of state liq companies know they are getting away with not having to pay the taxes they need to be paying. All we are asking is that if they want to sell to ny then it has to sit in ny for 48 hrs then be delivered by a teamster OR they can open up a wharehouse in ny and pay the taxes that they should be paying. Which they already stated they don’t want to have to do that. If ny was allowed to deliver into jersey and ct then it would be no problem but the law is VERY clear on we can not deliver out of state so why are they allowed to deliver into our state? So much money that can be generated for a state that already complains they don’t have money. So its not just about sws or empire wanna take over,its about protecting our jobs also

By: » The “at rest” legislative fight in New York State continues! JP stuff

Mon, 26 Mar 2012 20:37:47 +0000

[...] Put “at rest” to rest in NY – Tyler Colman, Dr. Vino Wine Blog http://www.drvino.com/2012/03/07/at-rest-ny-wine-wholesalers/ [...]