Oak Highlands’s Brewery is celebrating this Sunday with a big party.
Texas breweries that produce beer sold in grocery stores, bars and restaurants have been barred by Texas law from selling their own product directly to customers wanting to take it home. After Sunday, a new Texas law SB 1232 will change that.
“We are finally free of the chains that prohibited us from selling beer to go,” Brad Mall, owner of Oak Highlands Brewery told CBS.
Mall has kept a fridge labelled “beer to go” wrapped in chains and padlocked for years next to his bar.
“It was just my political statement to say that this is silly,” Brad Mall says. “You can walk into a winery and buy wine to go. You can walk into a distillery and buy distilled spirits to go, but you couldn’t buy into a production brewery and buy beer to go.”
Gov. Greg Abbott tweeted a video of him signing the new law.
In addition to the law, breweries will now become the only place in Texas where consumers can pick up beer before noon. They’ll be allowed to start selling at 10 a.m.
Mall says, instead of relying on the limited beers the brewery sells elsewhere, customers will also now be able to come in and shop from a brewer’s full range of offerings.
The new Texas laws taking effect on Sept. 1 include lemonade stands, tobacco and porch pirates. To see the full list of laws click here.
