Alabama finally legalized homebrewing.

[garymc]

So the wine can't be aged more than 90 days? That doesn't sound good.

 

[n2tazmania]

Let me clarify the AL law: 60 gallons a year total. 15 gallons per quarter total. No more than 15 gallons in possession or in household at any one time during the year. Transportation on public right of ways of 10 gallons or less is OK.

All of that is void if you live in a dry county, where it is still completely illegal. That means that in one-third of the state, it remains illegal to brew or ferment any quantity. I have not heard the level of the offense, but in the past it was a felony.

So yes, it allows for fermentation on an extremely limited basis for a certain group of people in areas that have approved commercial alcoholic sales. And it does decriminalize the possession of brewing or fermenting equipment.

On the other hand, the separate proposal to allow Alabama wineries to open off-site tasting rooms and sell their wine directly from those rooms did not make it out of committee. You can still sell commercially only from the winery itself, a very small volume business. But the beer and liquor distributors lobby is powerful.

Thus, lawmakers ensured that commercial wineries will not be able to grow in the state. All of its wineries are currently too small in production to interest a distributor in their wares. So you only get to buy big wines the big distributors have brought in, and they make the money. See how this works?

As far as Free the Hops, it is primarily a craft brewers organization intent on liberalizing the beer laws to allow for more commercial craft breweries. FTH is not nearly as big a supporter of individual rights to brew or ferment, as that potentially takes revenues from its member base. I'm not saying FTH did nothing to push the bill - it just did a lot less than it did to push the beer container size increase and other craft industry friendly reforms.

The penalty now is a class C misdemeanor not a felony. And it stinks that you can't brew in a dry county or municipality.

 

[olusteebus]

There is a lot of land mass in Alabama that is dry. fortunately, only two counties have no wet cities. Very moral counties indeed. I live 100 yards from one of those counties. It is a very nice county. I was driving through it today and wondering, what would it be like here if you could buy alcohol. Would it make the area less nice.

 

[jswordy]

The estimate I saw in the workup to passing the law is that there are only 5,000 people in Alabama who home brew or make wine, so there is not a huge demand for brew supply stores, etc. Especially with beer, it is cheaper to go buy your suitcase of Bud than it is to brew it.

 

[olusteebus]

We have a very good one here in Birmingham - beer and wine. We also have just a beer supply but it is not as good as our beer wine supply house.

There is one in Cullman but not a big inventory.

After shipping, I save a little money with my local than on line and it supports them.'

Now I can get the vineco kits off Amazon for a lot less but the quality is not as good.

 

[jswordy]

Yep, I know that Birmingham place. Too far of a drive for me. The brown truck brings my stuff. We have one that is a "back-shelf" operation in Huntsville. Now that it's legal, maybe they will make it more front-shelf. It's hit or miss whether they will have what you need. For my needs, the best way is to just order the stuff from up North where the big demand for it is. For now at least, shipping = Southern sales taxes. And they have everything.

On brewing in a dry county/municipality, my understanding of an analysis of the law is that if the wet city is in a dry county, you STILL can't ferment legally. That may be a misinterpretation, but that's what I read.