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Court of Appeal:
Winemakers Did Not Breach Law by Giving Nonoperational Pizza Oven to Grocery Store
By a MetNews Staff Writer
A decision of the Third District Court of Appeal, issued yesterday, spotlights a bureaucratic blunder by the Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control in ordering a 10-day suspension of the license of a family-run winemaking outfit by virtue of it supplying a supposed “thing of value” to a grocery store in the form of a nonoperational pizza oven used as part of a window display.
The Alcoholic Beverage Control Appeals Board reversed the license-suspension imposed on Bogle Vineyards, Inc. (Bogle) that was based on a supposed violation of Business and Professions Code §25502(a)(2), and the department sought a writ of review in the appeals court—which it issued. “We agree with the Board that the Department erred, and therefore reverse the Department’s decision and affirm the Board’s decision,” Justice Peter A. Krause wrote.
Wording of Statute
Sec. 25502 provides:
“a) No manufacturer, winegrower, manufacturer’s agent, California winegrower’s agent, rectifier, distiller, bottler, importer, or wholesaler, or any officer, director, or agent of any such person, shall, except as authorized by this division: [¶]…[¶] (2) Furnish, give, or lend any money or other thing of value, directly or indirectly, to…any person engaged in operating, owning, or maintaining any off-sale licensed premises.” The non-functional oven provided to a Raley’s store in South Lake Tahoe was used in a display, during “pizza month,” featuring a Bogle-branded oven, opened and unopened cases of Bogle, wine and a Bogle-branded pennant. As part of a promotion, a customer would receive $4 off a piece of pizza by buying a bottle of Bogle wine.
The Office of Attorney General represented the department in seeking reinstatement of the 10-day suspension.
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The Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control had no valid basis in imposing a 10-day license suspension on a maker of wines that supplied a nonoperational pizza oven to a grocery store to promote the sale of its product as an accompaniment to pizza, the Third District Court of Appeal held yesterday. |
Statute Is Inapplicable
Krause declared:
“[T]here is no evidence that Raley’s used the inoperative oven, retained the oven or any of its parts for later use, or secured any parts necessary to make the oven work.
“As a result, the pizza oven was not, as a legal matter, a ‘thing of value’ because it provided no benefit, and was of no use to Raley’s other than as advertising or promotional material. Indeed, there is no evidence that Raley’s attached any significance to the oven, nor could it, given that it was kept nonoperational, unused, and embedded in the store display until it was removed. Thus, the letter and purpose of the statute would not be met by finding the oven constituted a ‘thing of value’ under section 25502, subdivision (a)(2).”
Bogle supplied an oven to 88 Raley’s stores in California, but only the oven provided to the store in South Laje Tahoe was the subject of the administrative proceedings.
The case is Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control v. Alcoholic Beverage Control Appeals Board, 2022 S.O.S. 3906.
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