MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — The founder and co-owner of a Jefferson County distillery blames this week’s closure of the Charles Town business on West Virginia’s liquor taxes.
“We can’t survive,” Linda Losey with the now-shutdown Bloomery Plantation Distillery said of the current liquor law that requires distilleries to sell their products to the state and then buy them back with a 28 percent markup.
Additionally, there is another 10 percent minimum markup for retail.
“And we are the only state in the nation who charges this 10 percent market zone tax to hand back to the liquor stores,” she noted. “It’s a crazy, crazy upside-down model.”
Losey argued her business and other small distilleries like it that sell directly to customers should not be treated like holders of retail liquor licenses.
“When we did projections out to $10 million, we could never, ever, ever, ever be profitable under this model,” she said. “So we were wondering, why are we doing this? What are we doing? This is crazy.”
Up to now, efforts to change the classifications for distilleries and mini-distilleries in West Virginia have not been successful.
“We are aware of the concerns raised by the operator of Bloomery Distillery and we are working on the issue,” said Gary “Gig” Robinson, spokesperson for the state Alcohol Beverage Control Administration, in a statement provided to MetroNews.
“It’s a complicated matter that would not only affect 10 other distilleries in West Virginia, but also could have ramifications for all of the state’s other retailers who go through a bid process to sell their products legally in the state.”
Robinson said state officials are committed to “ensuring that state laws are fairly applied and create an equitable system for all of our liquor retailers and distillers like Bloomery Distillery.”
Losey was a guest on Friday’s MetroNews “Talkline.”