Jesse:

If you’re like me, you like going to breweries and liquor tasting rooms. The terminology makes them sound chic and classy, but they’re really just bars in disguise. They make you feel comfortable and right at home. Bring your dog, your grandmother, or just throw care to the wind and bring a baby. Any baby will do. And no matter how family friendly they may seem, these establishments are really just places to drink. Sure, they might offer some food—but the main attraction is the alcohol.

Lately, the public’s desire to go out has been building; people jump at the first opportunity to return to some semblance of normalcy. Paradoxically, people are clamoring for the opportunity to go out… to a place that makes them feel at home!

Some breweries have reopened pursuant to government permission, and they’ve been quickly filled by patrons. But this only leads other types of business left out of “America’s reopening” to complain and ask “why not us?”

The initial wave of places opening are largely confined to those enterprises which serve food… and most breweries and tasting rooms (for liquor and wine) are not restaurants and thus cannot legally open. But that’s a problem easily rectifiable by owners with a bit of legal savvy; many breweries nationwide have remedied the seeming restriction and said, “come dine at our parking lot food truck!” To turn a phrase: problem solved.

Or, rather, “problem solved” in theory, as the reasoning justifying a business’s reopening is that it is “essential” (that all too famous word!), and of course, you can argue that a restaurant is not essential. (After all, you can cook your own food.) Yet the criteria set in place declare restaurants essential, and ergo, fire up the tap room as long as Jerry’s Taco Truck is parked outside, ready to serve.

So with the addition of a food truck parked out front, an owner of ANY bar or ANY business can open… because they’re now an “essential businesses,” right? Wrong. Many places that have tried to skirt the measures set in place by local health officials have been “re-shutdown.” The aggrieved owners protest that it’s ridiculous to compel a shutdown of a business when patrons weren’t hurting anyone, were abiding by social distancing guidelines, and keeping their clothes on. (Turns out nudity is a surefire way to lose an operator license…)

But the real problem is with the NEXT type of business saying “why not us?” If a brewery can open, then why not the boutique clothing store, and why not the wine tasting room? Just pull up a food truck outside Forever 21 and you’re set to go!

For example, many florists have complained about not being deemed essential. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: there’s nothing more confusing than an angry florist. Kind of like a sad clown or a skinny chef. They argue that if you can pick up food to-go, then why not flowers to-go? And at first glance, the logic DOES make sense. Who’s to say what “essential” really means?

Well, I’ll step into the void. I’ll tell you what it means.

“Do you know anyone who has been sent away to a “retreat” because of their obsession with flowers?”

Do you know anyone who absolutely needs flowers to unwind after a stressful day? Know a teacher who just HAS to smell those flowers after a rough day with the kids in her class, or a carpenter who absolutely MUST take a sniff to numb the grueling daily backpain?

The point is that people NEED alcohol. This is the reason liquor stores were deemed essential from the beginning of the shutdown. It wasn’t that alcohol was essential for people to live… oh no. It was that if those stores were closed, people would break in and get what they NEED. It was a safety measure. That, and it turns out that the Florists Union pales in comparison to the power of America’s liquor lobby. If you were a government official on the take, what would swing YOUR corrupt execution of your office’s duties? A bouquet of flowers or a handle of the top shelf? I rest my case.

The point of all of this is to say that we all want to go out and enjoy some normalcy. We may even NEED it. But we’re all in this together—maybe for a long time. The reason you protect yourself in public is not about you, but about protecting those around you. And just like that, not opening up one business may not be about you, but about others around you who will ask “why not us?” The decision of whether to open or not would unequivocally then be “to wait.”

If nothing else, learn from spirit makers like us – we’ve perfected the art of waiting. Do you think it’s easy passing the time for 3 or 4 or 5 years while a whiskey ages to perfection? Absolutely not! But we do it. And just like combatting a global pandemic, it’s always worth the wait.