In an op-ed piece in the Newark (N.J.) Star-Ledger, Dennis Cakebread, chairman and co-owner of Cakebread Cellars, complains he can’t ship directly to consumers in New Jersey because New Jersey says wineries that produce 250,000 gallons of wine or more must use distributors.
He notes that “New Jersey is punishing itself because, according to a Rutgers University study, the state loses out on about $4 million a year in excise taxes that wineries collect and remit. That might not sound like a lot in terms of New Jersey’s annual budget, but it would have meant losing $44 million over the last 11 years. And if New Jersey chooses not to fix the problem, the lost collections will just keep growing.”
What he doesn’t say is whether he has tried to get New Jersey distributors to carry Cakebread wines. We suspect that’s because he hasn’t.