More gas stations want to sell beer on tap

DES MOINES, Iowa — Move over slushy machines. Gas stations and convenience stores are making room for a more adult beverage dispenser.

Draft beer taps where customers can have 64-ounce growlers filled with beer to go have been installed in dozens of gas stations, grocery stores and other retailers around the country.

About 35 states allow retailers to sell the refillable, half-gallon glass jugs known as growlers, according to the Brewers Association, a national trade group, and several states, including Florida, Iowa and Missouri are considering laws to allow the practice.

"It's definitely becoming more popular," said Paul Gatza, director of the Brewers Association, a national industry group. "The American public wants to be able to control their experience. They want to be able to take their beer home and pour as much or little as they want."

Some brewers, though, are skeptical about putting their beer on tap in gas stations and corner stores, and wholesalers have voiced opposition to growler-friendly laws, which they say undermine tested alcohol distribution systems.

Still, retailers are eager to tap into the nation's growing thirst for craft beer.

According to the Brewers Association, craft beer sales grew 22% in 2014 to $19.6 billion, although a portion of the increase was due to a looser definition of craft breweries.

One of the first retailers to embrace growlers was Sunoco. The fuel and convenience store company opened its first "Craft Beer Exchange" in 2011 in a Buffalo, N.Y., gas station.

Today, Sunoco fills growlers in 65 convenience stores in New York and South Carolina. Each has six to 12 beers on tap ranging from $8 to $20 per half-gallon. Customers can bring in an empty growler or buy one for about $4. Employees trained to work the taps fill and seal the growlers.

In the craft beer-loving Pacific Northwest, The Growler Guys has opened 10 franchises. The company's original location in a Shell gas station in Bend, Ore., has more than 30 beers on tap.

In Irvine, Calif., a company called The Growler Station manufactures equipment that uses carbon-dioxide to keep beer fresh longer in growlers. Since 2012, the company has installed its patented growler-filling system in more than 100 gas stations, grocery stores and other shops.

"I don't think it's going to be a flash in the pan," co-founder Tony Lane said. "We're trying to change the way beer is distributed."

But some brewers remain skeptical. Brewers guilds in Colorado and California have voiced opposition to retailers filling growlers, Gatza said. The concern is that a dirty keg line or an unwashed growler could result in tainted beer that reflects poorly on the brewer.

Dave Ropte, president of the Iowa Brewers Guild and co-founder of 515 Brewing in suburban Des Moines, said he is open to convenience stores selling growlers but would prefer customers buy beer directly from breweries.

"There's a reason gas stations and grocery stores want to do it," he said. "They can buy a keg a heck of a lot cheaper than they can buy bottles so they can make a lot more money selling growlers."

Beverage distributors have also voiced opposition to laws expanding where and how growlers can be sold.

"You're not selling something like popsicles," said Mike Heller, a lobbyist for the Iowa Wholesalers Association. "You're selling something that has a lot of taxation and a lot of controls on how it can be sold and distributed and we think those controls are good public policy dating back to Prohibition."

Aschbrenner also reports for the Des Moines Register