INDIANAPOLIS -- The bill to allow gas stations, grocery and convenience stores to sell cold beer has failed in the Senate Public Policy Committee in a 9 -1 vote, effectively making the proposal dead this year.
Indiana is the only state that regulates the temperature at which beer is sold.
Grocery and convenience stores and pharmacies can sell cold wine and warm beer. But the sale of carryout cold beer is primarily limited to liquor stores, whose owners say expanded cold beer sales would force many out of business.
Those supporting the change lampoon Indiana for being behind the times.
"I want what my consumers want and my consumers want cold beer. They're using a free ATM in our instance, they're getting gasoline, if they're a smoker, they're getting smokes... They want one spot to stop," said Jay Ricker, Chairman Ricker's convenience stores.
The Indiana Association of Beverage Retailers released the following statement following the hearing:
"The Indiana Association of Beverage Retailers applaud the Senate Public Policy Committee for rightly rejecting the misguided expansion of the sale of cold beer for carry-out. Now that this poor public policy has been soundly rejected by the Alcohol Code Revision Commission and by the Indiana State Legislature after months of hearings and testimony, we consider this issue settled. We remain fully committed to working with legislators on successfully passing a law that will allow for the sale of alcohol for carry out on Sunday for the first time since prohibition. It is time for Sunday sales!”
Watch the debate over cold beer sales and the vote below:
A House committee voted 12-1 earlier Wednesdayto support lifting Indiana's decades-old ban on Sunday carryout alcohol sales.
This is the furthest a Sunday alcohol sales bill has ever come in the state. An identical one passed in the Senate committee last week. Both bills would allow stores to sell carryout alcoholic beverages between noon and 8 p.m. on Sundays.
MORE | Sunday alcohol sales bill introduced in Indiana | Liquor and grocery stores team up to support Sunday alcohol sales | Poll finds 70 percent of Hoosiers want cold beer, Sunday carryout alcohol sales | It's not just us: Other states' odd liquor laws
