Liquor Provider Pulls Out of Plans

The planning for this year’s Harvard-Yale tailgate has hit another glitch. The alcohol distributor tapped to provide beer for The Game pulled out of negotiations earlier this month. With just three weeks until the event, Harvard must work to find a replacement.

United Liquors, the largest liquor distributor in Massachusetts, dropped the agreement because of the bad publicity associated with selling alcohol to College students, according to an employee of United Liquors who asked not to be named.

But Undergraduate Council President Matthew W. Mahan ’05 and Special Assistant for Social Programming Zachary A. Corker insisted that planning for the tailgate at Ohiri Fields will go on and that the search for a replacement has already begun.

“There was a misunderstanding-—they are now unable to supply us alcohol,” Corker said. “The [council] is looking for other distributors.”

In response to the Boston Police Department’s scrutiny of football tailgates, the College proposed a plan several weeks ago in which the Undergraduate Council, acting on behalf of the student body would secure a one-day liquor license from the city and purchase kegs from United Liquors. The beer the Council bought would be distributed at Ohiri Fields—the sole location of undergraduate tailgates this year for both Harvard and Yale.

At the time, Corker and Mahan said that United Liquors’ cooperation was crucial to the tailgate planning. Mahan announced United Liquors would provide the beer at a UC meeting earlier this month, but the distributor has since withdrawn from participating in the event.

The anonymous employee added that the UC’s assumption that United Liquors would have checked students’ IDs was false. Since United Liquors is a wholesaler, it would have provided pourers to help prepare the beer for distribution, he said, but under law would not have been allowed to check IDs.

“The license holder is legally responsible for IDs and intoxication-monitoring responsibilities,” the employee said.

Mahan said that the new retailer the council contracts will not provide pourers, servers, or ID checkers, but that the council has been talking about hiring a large Beverage Authorization Team.

The council still must seek the appropriate licenses before striking any agreement with a liquor provider and planning the tailgate, which is three weeks from tomorrow.

“We have an entertainment license and a liquor license to secure.” Mahan wrote in an e-mail.

The employee of United Liquors said it will be easy for Harvard to find a local retailer capable of supplying the beer necessary for the tailgate.

“Any licensee that sells kegs, if you wanted to go the draft beer route, has the ability to do something like this,” he said.

—Staff writer Rebecca D. O’Brien contributed to the reporting of this story.

—Staff writer Joshua P. Rogers can be reached at jprogers@fas.harvard.edu