Crystal Stump (founder and CEO of ABC Consulting and former special ABC Agent from the Alcohol Beverage Control Authority) explains How a Mobile Bartender Can Sell Alcohol.
Pour yourself a drink; you’re going to need it!
If you are a bartender and probably looking into becoming a mobile bartender, due to COVID-19, you are going to find this video very informative. At this point in time, you are probably wondering how you can travel around, as a bartender, and make drinks for people, right? In fact, we have many individuals inquiring in how to create a business where the truck is selling beer and mixed drinks, similar to a Food Truck! Unfortunately, there isn’t an alcohol license, in Virginia, that allows for mobile bartending or a Mobile Alcohol Truck. Rather than focusing on the sadness of not having a mobile margarita truck, Crystal explains how to serve, legally, and what IS allowed!
First, what do Mobile Bartenders do? And how can ABC Consulting help you? The only license that comes close to a Mobile Bartending license, in Virginia, is a one-day alcohol license, also known as a banquet license. It is a license that you will acquire for each event. We charge $195 to help you get this license. The $195 includes all the application fees, the state licensing fees, the online processing fees and our expert assistance of our consultants to answer any questions, all the way through approval.
If you want to bartend events and be able to make drinks for attendees, you can do that. It isn’t illegal. You can go to their house or their event and bartend for them. Where the problem really begins is when you start selling that alcohol, charging admission or taking donations. That cannot be done in the state of Virginia. The solution is that the person holding the event would pay you for your service. They cannot even pay you for the alcohol that you serve. They have to buy it, themselves, not from you. The workaround is that the person holding the event orders the alcohol and you can go pick it up and deliver it to the venue, as the contractor/employee. Then you can bring the alcohol back to the event, set it all up, and make the drinks. One more workaround, IF you are a nonprofit. If you are a non-profit organization, you can sell the drinks, you can sell tickets for the event, and you can sell tickets for the drinks. If you are a non-profit organization, there are a lot more Yes’s – selling drinks, buying the alcohol and selling admission. If you have more questions about nonprofit licensing, I encourage you to give us a call.
But for the individual having a birthday party, a wedding, or a retirement party, they need to apply for a one-day or banquet license. You, as the mobile bartender, could do all the licensing for them, including the paperwork and on-line application. We can help you with that. We can make sure, with you, that the on-line application is properly filled out so that it will be approved quickly and the turnaround time will be shortened, for the event’s alcohol licensing. We can help you with all of that, as the event’s mobile bartender.
Help your client get the proper licensing, as their mobile bartender, but you personally, cannot buy the alcohol, set it up and start selling admission or alcohol. Visit our website, here, and you’ll find a lot of information about the one-day license, and how it is broken down into two different types: an individual one-day license and a non-profit one-day license. Once your license is obtained? Your license needs to be in your hand and posted at the event.
Have more questions? We’d love to answer them: Crystal@VAabc.com or call 800-785-0161
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