Bottle battle: Boston talks of banning tiny bottles of booze

BOSTON (AP) — The little bottles of booze at Huntington Wine and Liquor are displayed prominently on the entrance counter of the Boston retailer, some stacked neatly in show circumstances, others tossed haphazardly in trays.

Steven Rubin, whose household has owned the shop since 1970, estimates that they account for as much as 15% of his gross sales.

“They’re a significant a part of our enterprise, and have a excessive revenue margin,” he mentioned.

However he could be on the verge of shedding these gross sales.

Boston Metropolis Councilor Ricardo Arroyo has proposed banning metropolis liquor shops from promoting the bottles that maintain from 50 to 100 milliliters (1.7 to three.4 fluid ounces), which he says would deal with each alcohol abuse and extreme litter.

“The truth that this dealt with even one among these two points would have been sufficient for me,” Arroyo mentioned at metropolis corridor listening to on the difficulty on Monday. “The truth that it performs in each of those points I feel is an amazing purpose to maneuver ahead with one thing like this.”

The little bottles are favored by individuals who wish to drink of their autos as a result of they’re straightforward to cover from police and the empties can simply be tossed out the window, Arroyo mentioned.

Dad and mom have informed him that also they are most well-liked by underage drinkers as a result of they’re straightforward to cover.

The final word choice on a ban on minis rests with the town’s Licensing Board, which regulates the town’s roughly 280 liquor shops. Board Chair Kathleen Joyce mentioned Monday that candidates for brand new licenses or license transfers are already requested to voluntarily agree to not promote the little bottles.

Different Massachusetts communities which have banned the sale of the tiny bottles have seen advantages, Arroyo mentioned.

Chelsea, the town simply to the north of Boston in 2018 turned the primary municipality within the state to ban liquor shops from promoting the bottles that value as little as 99 cents.

Town’s ambulance service responded to 742 requires alcohol-related points in 2017 — after which 556 in 2018, when the ban was in place for about half the 12 months, Arroyo mentioned in his proposal.

The variety of individuals taken into protecting custody dropped by 20% the primary two years of the ban and alcohol-related hospitalizations plummeted, Chelsea police Chief Keith Houghton mentioned in a latest interview.

“It wasn’t simply the aesthetic issues, with bottles in all places, we have been coping with public intoxication, we have been taking individuals into protecting custody and transporting them to the hospital,” he mentioned.

A ban would additionally profit the setting, Arroyo mentioned.

The discarded bottles, discovered clustered by the aspect of the highway, in parks, and in waterways, will not be biodegradable or recyclable. Within the Hyde Park neighborhood that Arroyo represents, a group volunteer cleanup crew collected 10,000 of the bottles in two months, he mentioned.

Banning the sale of miniature bottles had a measurable impact on decreasing litter in Falmouth, Alan Robinson, chair of the Falmouth Strong Waste Advisory Committee, mentioned in a latest phone interview.

Earlier than the Cape Cod group banned their sale in 2021, 32% of the objects picked up throughout roadside group trash collections have been the small bottles, he mentioned. Since then, roughly 6% of the litter objects are minis.

“It has made such a distinction,” mentioned Robinson, including that “everybody he speaks with” stories fewer of those tiny bottles.

Liquor shops are pushing again.

When the bottles are banned, regionally owned companies undergo financially, and the underlying issues of litter and alcohol abuse aren’t adequately addressed, Robert Mellion, the manager director of the Massachusetts Bundle Retailer Affiliation, mentioned in a latest phone interview.

When Chelsea banned the sale of the bottles, the native shops noticed a collective $6 million loss in enterprise in a number of months, whereas shops in neighboring communities like East Boston and Everett skilled larger gross sales.

“So individuals have been nonetheless shopping for them, they simply moved over the subsequent group,” he mentioned.

Or, Rubin mentioned, they merely purchase a bigger bottle of alcohol.

“In the event you eradicate the 50 milliliter and 100 milliliter bottles, all you do is create a marketplace for the bigger bottles, and the way does that deal with alcoholism?” he mentioned. “Folks simply purchase the subsequent measurement up and drink extra.”

Rubin and Mellion acknowledge that the little bottles are a trash drawback, however a gross sales ban shouldn’t be the reply.

The 800-member Massachusetts Bundle Retailer Affiliation helps an expanded bottle invoice that would come with a deposit on the miniature bottles, Mellion mentioned.

“I feel there we’ve got a statewide resolution to the trash drawback,” he mentioned

Jim Rossi, a Huntington Wine and Liquor buyer who stopped within the retailer on a latest afternoon for some beer and tiny bottles of cinnamon whisky, agreed.

“In the event that they’re anxious concerning the litter, why don’t they put a deposit on them?” he mentioned. “Folks could be snapping them up from the streets for the deposit identical to they do with the discarded cans.”