Mississippi Bar Shelves Are Empty as the State’s ABC Stalls

Booze shelves in Mississippi are becoming increasingly empty as the state-run Alcohol Beverage Control (ABC) grapples with a massive shipment backlog caused by warehouse issues. Business owners — from boutique wine shops to large casinos — are missing deliveries that, in some cases, amount to hundreds of thousands of dollars of inventory, Mississippi Today reported.

Businesses are receiving just portions of their initial orders — if they arrive at all. Some reported the ABC is multiple weeks late on orders. Bars, restaurants, liquor stores, and other alcohol suppliers across Mississippi are worried about staying afloat while they are out of stock on a slew of products.

Late deliveries aren’t anything new for Mississippi’s ABC warehouse. Delayed shipments from the ABC impacted business in past years, prompting the state Legislature to invest $55 million in an updated warehouse in 2022. At a House State Affairs hearing on Tuesday, Chris Graham, commissioner of the Department of Revenue and chair of the National Alcohol Beverage Control Association board of directors, said the current delays arose after issues with the software company who formerly operated the new warehouse’s conveyor belt system. The warehouse then implemented a new software system for the conveyor belts, but it was not compatible with the existing machinery. Mississippi’s ABC was then forced to implement a slower pick-and-pallet packaging system, drastically curtailing production.

Mississippi is one of 17 states that rely on a government-run liquor authority to facilitate the process from wholesalers to retailers, bars, restaurants, and other alcohol vendors and collect taxes. In Mississippi, wholesale spirits and wine orders go through the state’s single ABC warehouse in Gluckstadt.

Graham predicts the warehouse will work through half of the backlog by March and all of it by May, the Magnolia Tribune reports. Lawmakers and industry folk brainstormed a number of solutions for the meantime during Tuesday’s hearing, including a one hundred-case limit to orders, a self-pickup system from the warehouse, and a temporary allowance for businesses to receive orders directly from wholesalers, but no decision has been made.

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