Happy hours did have a heyday in Tar Heel State. Just not anymore.
Brian Gordon| USA Today Network
Question: Why can't North Carolina restaurants host happy hours?
Short Answer: Concerns over drunk driving led North Carolina to ban limited drink specials in the 1980s, and the state is now one of only eight to prohibit happy hours.
Though some would surely like to grab a discounted beer (or beers)at certain times of the day, representatives of the state's food and beverage industrysay getting back happy hourisn’t currently a top priority.
LongerAnswer: Alcoholic drinks can’t be sold at free or reduced prices in North Carolina for limited hours. A bar can sell drinks at a discounted rate for an entire day, but not less. Businessesalso can’t offer discounts for only certain customers (so no ladies’ nights, college nights, annoyed journalists’ nights, etc.).
Happy hours did have a heyday in the Tar Heel State, albeit a briefone. The concept gained popularity in the late 1970s once North Carolina began allowing bars and restaurants to serve individual liquor drinks. Newspapers wrote about the new drink deal trend with quotes: "happy hours".
However in 1985, a year after the National Minimum Drinking Age Act raised the drinking age to 21, North Carolina legislators were vocally opposing the practice.
“We’re glamorizing and promoting it as if it’s lemonade,” Rep. Coy Privette (R-Cabarrus) said at the time.
Privette was a Baptist pastor, Christian activist and a teetotaler (he’d later be charged with multiple counts of aiding and abetting prostitution, but that’s another matter). He believed happy hours contributed to drunk driving, a worry shared by many of his colleagues on both sides of the aisle.
“I think happy hours encourage consumption at the wrong times, when people are tired and are on their way home,” said Rep. Martin Lancaster, a Democrat who would later serve in Congress and the Clinton Administration. Lancaster introduced a bill to eliminate limited drink specials.
NC Answers: Is the Carolina panther still lurking in the shadows?
NC Answers: How do cities catch short-term rental violators?
But before the General Assembly could pass a bill, the North Carolina Alcoholic Beverage Control (ABC) Commission beat them to it: putting a happy hour ban into effect in August 1985. The ABC Commission is a state agency that controls how all alcoholic beverages in North Carolina are made, transported and sold.
Today, North Carolina is one of eight states without happy hours. The others — Massachusetts, Indiana, Alaska, Rhode Island, Vermont, Utah, and Oklahoma — are geographically and politically diverse.
As for whether happy hours will make a resurgence, the topic is down on the list of changes business owners have wanted to see, said Lynn Minges, president of the North Carolina Restaurant and Lodging Association (NCRLA)
“There have been so many other more pressing issues that have demanded our attention and we've chosen to focus on those,” she said.
A few years ago, the NCRLA successfully lobbied for a brunch bill that allowed alcohol to be sold on Sundays as early as 10 a.m. Alcohol sales had previously beenprohibited before noonon Sundays.
More recently, the association has pushed to create more social districts, extend alcohol service in outdoor dining settings, and allow restaurants to order liquor from ABC stores online.
North Carolina is also currently facing a widespread liquor shortage, a problem that prompted the head of the ABC Commission to resign earlier this year.
So, happy hours may not be top-of-mind at the moment. Some restaurantowners, Minges pointed out, may like not feeling the competitive pressures to offer limited drink specials. "Given the situation they've all struggled through during COVID, (happy hour) is probably not something that they are eager to do right now,” she said.
Austin Jordan, general manager at the Jack of the Wood pub in Asheville, said the lack of happy hours hasn't hampered sales. He offered afternoon specials when working at a bar in Virginia and noted these discounts did draw in the after-work crowd.Buthe said his currentbar gets by just fine doing selectdrink specials — dollar off bourbons, $7 Moscow Mules — that (by law) run all day.
NC Answers:Why is Real ID delayed again? What is the new deadline? How do I get it?
Brian Gordon is a statewide reporter with the USA Today Networkin North Carolina. Reach him at bgordon@gannett.com or on Twitter @briansamuel92.
