Tennessee Liquor Stores Can Now Sell On Sundays

NASHVILLE, TN -- Don't fret if you forget to buy wine for a Sunday dinner party on Saturday night. The neighborhood liquor store may very well be open Sunday afternoon.

Gov. Bill Haslam signed the Sunday wine and liquor sales act into law Friday morning and it has immediate effect for liquor stores.

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With the short notice, not all package stores may be prepared for Sunday hours (if your local package store is open Sunday, send an email to james.lind@patch.com or tweet to @jrlind). Grocery stores will have to wait until January 1 to begin Sunday wine sales.

Stores will be able to sell wine and liquor between 10 a.m. and 11 p.m. on Sundays. It also opens up sales on Independence Day and New Year's Day, but maintains the sales ban on Christmas Day, Thanksgiving and Easter for liquor stores. Grocery stores may sell wine on any holiday.

Liquor stores must also now sell spirits at a cost at least 10 percent higher than the wholesale cost. A 20 percent markup already applied to wine.

Tennessee's Sunday liquor and wine sales ban came into sharp focus in 2017, as it does every seven years or so, when liquor stores were closed on Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, New Year's Eve and New Year's Day.

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