Weekends are ideal for holding tastings

By Luke E. Saladin

Post staff reporterIf a miniature "wine country" is to emerge in southern Campbell County, a few things will need to change.

That is why the Northern Kentucky Vintners and Grape Growers Association is asking the Campbell County Fiscal Court to approve an ordinance that would allow packaged liquor sales on Sundays between the hours of 11 a.m. and midnight.

Similar ordinances have been adopted by numerous Northern Kentucky cities and Boone County.

Without a local ordinance, the sale of beer, wine and liquor by the drink is goverened by state law, which allows such sales at hotels, motels and restaurants beginning at 1 p.m. on Sundays.

Larry Leap, president of the association and owner of Lost Heritage Vineyards in Campbell County, said several growers have expressed interest in opening wine-tasting rooms - which also sell bottles of wine - in the Camp Springs area sometime in the near future.

The busiest days for such establishments are during the weekend, Leap said, making Sunday sales an imperative.

"A wine region in Northern Kentucky is not going to flourish unless we are able to sell wine on Sundays," Leap said. "We expect to make a lot of retail sales when people come out to taste the wine."

It was the city of Bellevue that started the trend toward packaged liquor sales last year, following a state appeals court ruling in July that gave cities the option to approach such sales.

Campbell County Administrator Robert Horine said the Fiscal Court is expected to give preliminary approval to the new ordinance on May 4.

"This is something we probably wouldn't have bothered with if it wasn't for the emerging wine industry out there," Horine said. "We wanted to allow them to pursue these types of operations."

Grape growers this spring are planting more than 10,000 grape vines in vineyards across Northern Kentucky.

Leap said the grape growers association would ask Carroll, Kenton and Grant counties in the coming months to adopt similar ordinances allowing Sunday liquor sales.

The Northern Kentucky Vintners & Grape Growers Association has 27 growers in Northern Kentucky, 70 student members and about 15 allied members who support the wine business, such as label makers.

Lost Heritage is the only winery in Campbell County, but there are several in Northern Kentucky, including River Valley Winery in Carrollton, said Dennis Walter, vice president of the grape growers association who grows grapes in his Stonebrook Vineyards in Camp Springs and plans to open the Stonebrook Tasting Room at his vineyard this summer.

Publication date: 04-27-2005