I am not particularly a drinker. I don’t even remember the last time I set foot in a liquor store. My vice is Diet Coke. I used to buy it at Costco any time I found myself in Burlington. Then one day they didn’t carry it any longer. The reason was that Coke wouldn’t give Costco a deep discount so they refused to sell Coke products any longer. I canceled my membership.

The reason I am telling you this is the new idea that big box stores (Costco and Sam’s where you must pay membership), are better for selling liquor than our local state stores. I just keep thinking about my Diet Coke. If the only place allowed to sell Coke products is a box store, and they refused to carry that brand because they can’t get a larger discount, I would have to go to Canada for my beverage of choice. There are days when this would not seem at all illogical. That would not raise taxes money for this state.

Right now each small town in this county has a liquor store which employs locals. If the big box stores are the only ones who sell liquor, Island County will be basically a dry county and there will be more unemployed people on this island. We would have to travel to what my friends call “the dark side of the water” to get whatever liquor they may decide to carry.

If we lived in a large city with the rest of the beehive dwellers, the big box store idea may sound great. But to me it just doesn’t sound logical. I want my choice and I want to buy it “on the rock.”

Sharyn Mellors
Coupeville