Alcohol wholesalers are seeking to intervene in a lawsuit challenging the legality of Connecticut’s mandatory minimum pricing laws.
In a request filed Thursday with the U.S. District Court of Connecticut, the Wine & Spirit Wholesalers of Connecticut calls the state’s statutory minimum pricing laws “a cornerstone” of its members’ business relationships with state-licensed retailers. They want to intervene on behalf of the state, against a suit brought in August by Total Wine & More, which alleges Connecticut’s minimum pricing laws restrain trade and amount to unfair trade practices.
According to the association’s Executive Director Lawrence Cafero Jr., a former Republican House minority leader, the pricing laws prohibit wholesalers from charging different retailers different prices for the same alcoholic beverage and prohibit both wholesalers and retailers from selling below cost. That is a prohibition against price discrimination, Cafero maintains.
He calls the laws “critical to the business and economic interests of wholesalers” and to their profitability.
The wholesalers’ association also argues in its memorandum that, in addition to its “substantial economic interests,” those interests are not adequately represented by Connecticut’s attorney general, since the wholesalers are more deeply and directly concerned with “their own economic welfare and maintaining fair competition in the marketplace.”
Robert M. Langer and Deborah A. Skakel, attorneys for the wholesalers’ group, say in the filing that Attorney General George Jepsen consents to the intervention, but Total Wine and More does not “at this time.”
Edward Cooper, vice president, public affairs and community relations for Total Wine & More, could not be reached immediately for comment.
