Total Wine & More
UPDATED
Alcohol mega retailer Total Wine & More will open its second store in the area at 8280 S. Tamiami Trail in Pelican Plaza across from Sarasota Square on Thursday at 9 a.m.
Here's a development I didn't see coming. The store will be the chain's first in Florida to sell growlers, according to a tweet they sent me:
@AlanCShaw This store will be our first FL location offering growlers! Listing available soon at http://t.co/CUXl2vgHJp
— Total Wine (@TotalWine) October 21, 2014
Growlers are reusable jugs of beer that are filled from a tap. They let people take draft beer home to enjoy. This is useful because many beers are only available in kegs and aren't sold in bottles or cans.
In Florida, only 32-ounce and 128-ounce growlers are legal, instead of the industry standard 64-ounce size.
The list of beers available for growler fills will be available at totalwine.com/whatsontap.
Update: Total Wine says they can only fill 32-ounce growlers. You can bring your own empty growler for them to fill, but it must be made of glass and translucent (brown glass is OK) so they can monitor the fill level. In other words, no aluminum growlers.
Total Wine will be using a Pegas system to fill the growlers. Here's a video showing a 64-ounce growler being filled with the system:
Total Wine would be the first store in Sarasota-Manatee to fill growlers. Currently several beer bars and all the production breweries in the two counties fill growlers. Our two brewpubs aren't permitted to sell beer to go.
