Supermarkets - got kids, can't buy alcohol

Sherri - posted on 09/27/2011

Becky we are due just about the same time I am 19wks, due date Feb 21st. Do you know what you are having? Mine is my 4th boy.

Becky - posted on 09/27/2011

I'm 21 weeks. Thanks, Sherri! Same to you! :)

Stifler's - posted on 09/27/2011

Weird. Our bottle shops carry everything. Some don't have Malibu cans though.

Sherri - posted on 09/27/2011

Rebecca the only place to buy beer or wine coolers here are grocery stores or convenient stores they do not carry those items in a liquor store that is for hard alcohol only.

Rebecca - posted on 09/27/2011

If they are so concerned about protecting children from drinking, why not just stop carrying alcohol entirely?

Sherri - posted on 09/27/2011

Becky I notice you have your ultrasound pic as your profile pic. How far along are you? Congratulations by the way.

Becky - posted on 09/27/2011

Well, yes, I guess you would drive to the liquor store too. I don't know, to me a gas station just seems like a weird place to sell beer. The one I'm thinking of was on the highway in Mass., out in the middle of nowhere. Likely most of their business was from people passing through on road trips. It seemed odd to see alcohol there. But that's just me and maybe my weird ideas. :)

Medic - posted on 09/27/2011

FYI even at walmart the self checkout checks your id when you buy beer or smokes....just sayin... As for not being able to purchase beer at the store because your kids are with you that is redonkulous. I take my 12 year old niece with me to the store and she looks 16-17 and buy beer with our groceries. Granted she is not drinking any of it but if she were it is none of anyone elses business but mine hers and her moms.

Sherri - posted on 09/27/2011

It happens here on occasion too Tracey. I just send my teenager elsewhere while I check out. They never give me a hard time with my 5yr old or 13yr old though. My 13yr old looks incredible young though.

Julianne - posted on 09/27/2011

Drive through liquor store. We have one in Sydney, it kind of an oxymoron though, since its illegal to have accessible liquor in your vehicle. They give you liquor, that needs to be put in an accessible spot because your driving! Its not like people pull over after going through the drive through to put it in their trunk. So it defeats the purpose of having a drive through liquor store.

Stifler's - posted on 09/27/2011

There's no supermarkets with alcohol here! :( I take my children into the drive through bottle o in the car all the time.

Rosie - posted on 09/27/2011

don't you drive to the liquor store too though becky?

Becky - posted on 09/27/2011

Well, that is better, if there is some security. But I have seen it right out in the open. And what I find more odd is that beer is sold in gas stations, which, presumably, the majority of people stop at when they're driving. And I've always seen it very accessible there. But it's not illegal to have open alcohol in a vehicle in the US either, is it? It is here. No one in the vehicle is allowed to be drinking, not just the driver. Even in limos, apparently, although everyone drinks in them anyway!
I swear, in this store, the cigarettes were right out in the open, very accessible. I can't remember where it was. Maybe Fargo. I was so surprised that I commented on it to the cashier. But, that is the only store I've ever seen it in, and to be fair, it didn't have self-checkouts.

Ashley=) - posted on 09/27/2011

We have machines behind the counter for smokes.If you want them the shopkeeper has to select them from the machine like a sweet vending machine..if you get me.Very safe and also alcohol is security tagged.Its right at the back of the supermarket so you have to walk a bit to the exit if you steal it.lolPeople have got caught many a time before the security alarms.Most of them adults shoplifting.

They check id a lot to.I have been asked..the very few times i bought a bottle of wine as i don't drink on a weekly basis..more like every 5-6 mths if i am lucky.Parties etc.Not a home drinker and my partner does not drink.Many people think thats funny..as if he was a drinker and quit lol..nope he just does not like alcohol.

Rosie - posted on 09/27/2011

in my store the liquor has antitheft thingys on them, some of it's locked. also the alcohol department is a seperate area of the store. kinda like a store in a store?

smokes are never left anywhere where people can just walk up and get them. and if you go through a self checkout with alcohol, it makes someone come over to check ID.

Becky - posted on 09/27/2011

Well, I can understand not selling alcohol in supermarkets and gas stations. It is easier for a minor to shoplift alcohol from a supermarket than it is from a liquor store. Supermarkets are large, usually have at least 2 entrances, and aren't generally that well patroled. And a teen wandering through alone doesn't really stand out. A liquor store is smaller, usually only has one entrance which you have to go through the till to get to, and a teen or group of teens in there without an adult would stand out. Also, in a liquor store, if you look young, they will card you. Will they do that in a supermarket? I know that if kids really want to get alcohol, they are going to get it, but why make it easier for them?

We were travelling in the US last year and went to Walmart and they had their cigarettes just on an open wall near the door! I was just blown away. Those are so easy to steal that way! Or grab a pack and go through the self check-out to avoid being carded. Here, they have to be behind the cash desk or at a separate till and you have to ask for them and show ID.

Ashley=) - posted on 09/27/2011

There going to go else where so there protecting nobody.Kids will follow there parents to other shops who will sell them alcohol.I don't get it.
I get not selling it to people who have been drinking or smell of it.I have seen this were i live in supermarkets.I think thats great but again they go other places to.

Rosie - posted on 09/27/2011

that's crazy! i don't get the reasoning...

i think it's weird to NOT have alchol and hard liquor in supermarkets, lol. i'd be pissed if i had to go somewhere else.

Anna - posted on 09/27/2011

I'm in the USA and have never had this exact problem but I have heard of people trying to buy alcohol with a teen in tow and have a problem. I think once it was established that it was their own kid they were allowed to continue. It makes sense that if say, a 22 year old walks in with his 16 year old friend and tries to buy alcohol, he could very well be purchasing for a minor. You would think though that cashiers could use some common sense and know that parents don't buy for their toddlers. There is such an identifiable difference.

JL - posted on 09/27/2011

Sounds like they are making the assumption that you are apparently a crappy parent who is going to get your kid drunk or get shit faced on the way home driving while your kid is in the car. I don't really drink but what if I happen to be purchasing rum or wine for a recipe. Privacy rights, please. Stay out of my business or you won't get any of my business.

Brittany - posted on 09/27/2011

I live in South Alabama and they do sell Alcohol in the Grocery Stores. They do not sell liquor. They sell wine, wine coolers, drink mixes, and beer.

Brittany - posted on 09/27/2011

I live in the USA but, I always feel weird when I buy alcohol when I have my children with me. We have no laws against it and it should be obvious I am not going to let my kids drink, they are 5, 4 and 3. I just always feel like people are judging me. I suppose I should not care but, it does bug me sometimes.

I do think it is insane they are refusing to allow you to purchase the alcohol. How do they know what you are going to use it for? Seeing has how there are no laws on drinking in your home. You could be buying the wine for cooking. Sounds like someone just got a corn cob up their butt if you ask me.

Even if you do buy it for your daughter, what business is it of theirs? She is YOUR daughter. You pay her bills and wash her clothes.

Julianne - posted on 09/27/2011

I went in to get some wine a couple times with gabby, carried it home in her stroller too. I think the law is stupid.

Here you cant go into smoke shops with a minor. I tried to pick brad up a pack of cigs and they kicked me out because my daughter was with me!

Teresa - posted on 09/27/2011

That law wouldn't personally bother me since I don't ever buy alcohol, but I do think it's pretty stupid.

Becky - posted on 09/27/2011

Like Heather said, they don't sell alcohol in the supermarkets here anyway. But I do think that's a dumb policy. Whether someone brings their kids with them to buy alcohol or not has no impact whatsoever on whether their children are consuming that alcohol! And if a teen is giving you money to go in and buy them some booze, then likely the teen is waiting outside, not coming in with you to raise suspicion!
I am pretty sure that my husband has stopped at the liquor store to buy a case of beer when he had the boys with him and brought them into the store with him. The alternative is leaving a 2 and 3 year old in the vehicle alone and we all know how people feel about that!

Lady Heather - posted on 09/27/2011

Well first off - we don't even have alcohol at the supermarkets here so I'm just jealous it's ever possible.

But that is just plain stupid. As I have said in another discussion, I don't drink anymore but I sometimes cook with wine or beer. They are ingredients. And gasp - my daughter totally sees me throwing some wine into the stew! I'm such a horrible influence.

We buy alcohol pretty often but drink it so little that when the husband had a glass of wine one night Freja called it "grandpa's drink" because she only ever sees it consumed at his house. Haha. The idea that seeing you purchase it will encourage underage drinking is hilarious. Pretty sure the parents that want to drink are going to do regardless of how it has to be purchased.

Sarah - posted on 09/27/2011

Which supermarket was this?

Tracey - posted on 09/27/2011

It is illegal to buy alcohol for underage kids, mainly aimed at stopping kids approaching you and giving you money so you can go and buy their booze, and kids cannot drink in public.
In your own home there is no law about minimum drinking age. This seems to be an over enthusiastic interpretation of a particular supermarket chain's policy on buying / selling alcohol. It has affected people who have shopped for years without problems ranging from mums with babies to pensioners with their teenage grandchildren.
The same supermarket chain also banned customers from taking in balloons which it was giving away outside in case a customer was allergic to them.

Sarah - posted on 09/27/2011

That's crazy! I've never heard of it myself, I would be seriously pissed off though and take my custom elsewhere!

Jodi - posted on 09/27/2011

So......are they also stopping these adults buying cigarettes? After all, maybe they are passing THOSE on to these underage hellions, right?

Sapphire - posted on 09/27/2011

I think it's silly and see no correlation between having children grocery shopping with you while buying beer, booze, wine and children needing protection. Is this a federal law, or a partciular store policy?

~♥Little Miss - posted on 09/27/2011

Oh for crying out loud. When I was young, we would help my mom carry out her purchases. I am not a drinker....did not taint me.

Krista - posted on 09/27/2011

That's the silliest damn thing I've ever heard. So you can't buy booze if you have a kid with you, but you're allowed to have it in your house...which is where the kid lives.

Jodi - posted on 09/27/2011

WTF? That's insane.

What are the laws in relation to refusing to sell it? I know that here, where I live, they have recently had to change legislation so that business can CHOOSE to be able to stop sales to a certain type of consumer who can *legally* buy, but the store wishes to refrain from selling to (in this case, it is refusal of service to school age children during school hours to discourage truancy, but they have had to legislate to be allowed to discriminate).

I must ask, however, are these isolated cases against particular people (in which case, the person serving probably KNOWS the person involved and know that they just use it to get shitfaced in front of their kids)? Or are we talking particular store denying everyone who comes in with children?

Emma, our local IGA's have alcohol too. All through the same register.

Jen - posted on 09/27/2011

Oh that's not going to fly with me. Fine, I'll go alone and buy a few cases and whip out my kid's picture at the checkout.

Kellie - posted on 09/27/2011

Some Coles have a Liquorland attached to them here Emma, but they're few and far between and you can't pay for your groceries in liquorland or your grog in Coles, but you can access one throu the other.

That is crap though.

Stifler's - posted on 09/27/2011

And yes that is bullshit how do they know people who buy alcohol and don't have kids with them don't have kids at home?

Stifler's - posted on 09/27/2011

I wish we were allowed to buy alcohol in the supermarket in Australia so I wouldn't have to go to the bottle o separately. it's such a pain in my arse.