COLONIE — As Market 32/Price Chopper prepares to seek State Liquor Authority approval next week to move its Latham liquor store next to its flagship Market 32, a competing business owner is asking whether the supermarket chain has received favorable treatment, which its president emphatically denies, and raising other concerns.
A hearing before the SLA board is scheduled for Wednesday, according to the meeting agenda. It indicates that Market 32/Price Chopper wants to relocate the 1,478-square-foot Latham Liquors store in New Loudon Center plaza, which the company bought last fall, to a space twice the size that is about 500 feet south in the same plaza and next to the newly renovated Market 32. Previously contained within the 88,000-square-foot store and used for a cooking school and in-house restaurant, the space is now walled off and would have a separate entrance from within the vestibule leading to the supermarket, according to Blaine Bringhurst, president of Market 32/Price Chopper.
State law prohibits grocery stores from selling wine or spirits, but they may own a single separately licensed liquor store. Locally, BJ’s Wholesale Club in Northway Shopping Center in Colonie operates a liquor store at the front, with a separate entrance. Members of the Wegmans family individually own liquor stores next to several of their supermarkets, according to syracuse.com; the Costco warehouse store in Oceanside on Long Island adjoins the company’s only New York liquor store; and Trader Joe’s operated a liquor store next to its Manhattan location for 15 years before it closed in 2022…