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Sunday July 11, 2010 | 01:00 AM

They could have just put it on the shelves.

Pennsylvania’s convoluted liquor sales scheme has taken yet another crooked step with the installation of two “wine kiosks” in supermarkets. If the test proves successful the Liquor Control Board plans about 100 more across the state, including at Weis in Dallas and Wegmans in Wilkes-Barre Township.

Woo-hoo! Thanks to the new consumer-friendly LCB you’ll have 53 wines to choose from on the way between the bread aisle and dairy case. “Choose” may be too strong a word, though, since the wines will be chosen for you by the same people who stock their retail stores with endless supplies of usual suspect brands or obscure names selected more for profit potential than pleasurable drinking.

I expect a call Monday disputing that last statement, so I’ll preempt with this: some of the most popular wines at the moment are ros�s and the best of them come from southern France.

The real home of ros� is even smaller, the southern reaches of the Provence region.

Guess how many Proven�al ros�s I can find in my local “Premium Collection Store.” None. In fact, unless they’ve gone to great lengths to hide them, there appear to be only two French ros�s in stock but several Australian and California imitators that likely yield higher margins.

My guess is there won’t be any Proven�al ros�s in the kiosks.

This lack of selection is about more than whining oenophiles. Selling wine and liquor is big business for Pennsylvania; according to the LCB website the state is the nation’s largest buyer of wine and spirits, “and passes significant volume purchase discounts on to customers.”

Really? Then why is it that when I shop at private stores in other states the prices are seldom higher than in Pennsylvania and often lower? And rather than stacked cases of specials at not-so-special prices I can choose from a broad selection chosen by a store owner who caters to the tastes of his customers.

Does Pennsylvania make a bundle off its archaic controlled liquor sale system.

You bet; sales in the 2008-09 fiscal year were nearly $1.9 billion. In addition to collecting $375 million in taxes, $125 million was transferred to the state’s general fund. That’s a powerful incentive for the status quo.

Would the state and customers be served better if the 621 LCB stores were sold into private hands? Beyond the one-time sale of licenses, the financial benefits are debatable, although there’s little doubt that stores near Pennsylvania’s borders would hang on to oodles of customers who now travel for better deals and selection. To really make a difference, Pennsylvania would have to adopt a startling new concept – free enterprise – and allow entrepreneurs to set up shop where they see opportunity.

Someplace like Shickshinny, where the LCB pulled out in 2006. If you happen to live there you’ll have to drive to Nanticoke or Berwick for a bottle of Chardonnay to pour with dinner. Unless the state believes it’s protecting folks in Shickshinny from a localized tendency to overindulge, they’ve lost sales and the taxes that go along with them.

Multiply that by hundreds of other towns with no store and you could be talking serious money.

The same potential lurks in the state’s hundreds of supermarkets, which surely would respond to demand for more than 53 predictable wines, or at least would supply ones their customers want to buy.

They could have put it on the shelves.

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