Liquor license auction draws only one bid

A sealed-bid liquor license auction held Tuesday by the Township of Cherry Hill drew just one bidder: a company run by the family that owns a group of ShopRite supermarkets.

Brett, Jason, and Shawn Ravitz are partners in Empire Liquors L.L.C., which township officials said bid $501,000 on the distribution license.

The Ravitzes intend to sell alcohol inside the ShopRite store at the Garden State Pavilion, said ShopRite spokeswoman Karen Meleta.

"It's really a convenience to our customers," Meleta said. She said they plan to sell alcohol in a renovated section at the front of the store, where a coffee and flower shop used to be located.

The township recently lifted a long-standing ban on liquor sales within grocery stores.

While the auction garnered only one bid, "as far as we're concerned, that was $76,000 above the minimum," Palmer said. "We feel it was a successful auction."

Palmer had said the township decided to conduct the auction through sealed bids in hope of heightening competition for the license.

The bid still needs approval from the township council, which last month passed an ordinance allowing liquor to be sold in any store of at least 15,000 square feet if sales are confined to a separate area and purchases are at designated cash registers.

Previously, alcohol could only be sold by stand-alone stores. Wegmans built a liquor store outside its Garden State Park supermarket after obtaining a license in 2007.

A family member of the Wegmans ownership paid $500,000 for the license, which was bought from another business.

The same year, a license was sold for $1.6 million to Swanky Bubbles, a restaurant that later declared bankruptcy. That license was resold in 2011 for $500,000 to the developers of Garden State Park.

Tuesday's auction was run by the township, which set a minimum bid of $425,000 for the first liquor license it had sold in at least 15 years.

The state limits how many licenses a municipality may issue, based on population. Cherry Hill, which has eight distribution licenses, learned it could issue another after a business failed to renew its permit, rendering it defunct, said township spokeswoman Bridget Palmer.

Palmer did not know the name of the business or when the license became defunct. The determination was made by the state, she said.

This week's auction was originally scheduled for February. It was postponed as township officials revised the ordinance lifting the ban on liquor sales in grocery stores.

Officials said they wanted to ensure that Cherry Hill's supermarkets could compete with grocery stores in municipalities without similar restrictions.

Liquor store owners, however, argued that the change would hurt small business owners and give an unfair advantage to supermarkets.

In February, New Jersey Liquor Store Alliance president Paul Santelle accused Cherry Hill Mayor Chuck Cahn of trying "to stack the deck in favor of the ShopRite."

Palmer called those claims "patently false."

Meleta said selling alcohol in ShopRite stores was "not something that [the owners] have pursued, but when the opportunity did come up," they were interested.

She noted that some other ShopRites already sell alcohol, including one in Cinnaminson. None of the five stores owned and operated by the Ravitzes - in addition to the Garden State Pavilion location, the family runs a second Cherry Hill store on Evesham Road - sells liquor.

The township council will decide whether to approve the bid at a forthcoming meeting, Palmer said. Background checks must also be conducted, and the state has to approve the license number.