(a) A California brandy wholesaler’s license may be issued only to the holder of a beer and wine wholesaler’s license, and authorizes the person to whom it is issued (hereafter in this section called “licensee”) to sell only brandy produced in California to persons holding licenses authorizing the sale of brandy, and to export that brandy, subject to all of the following conditions:
(1) The licensee shall:
(A) Maintain warehouse space either owned or leased by him or her or dedicated to his or her use in a public warehouse which space is sufficient to store at one time a stock of California brandy whose cost of acquisition is one hundred thousand dollars ($100,000) or more.
(B) Maintain at all times in his or her warehouse either owned or leased by him or her or in space dedicated to his or her use in a public warehouse a stock of California brandy whose cost of acquisition is one hundred thousand dollars ($100,000) or more. If a licensee has more than one licensed premise, he or she shall be required to maintain warehouse space for and a stock of California brandy whose cost of acquisition is one hundred thousand dollars ($100,000) or more only in connection with one licensed premise. For each of the remaining licensed premises, the licensee shall be required to maintain warehouse space for and a stock of California brandy whose cost of acquisition is thirty thousand dollars ($30,000) or more. The stock of California brandy required by this paragraph shall be owned by the licensee, not held on consignment, and not acquired pursuant to a prior agreement to sell it to a specific licensee or licensees.
(2) The licensee shall sell California brandy to retailers generally, rather than a few selected retailers. A licensee who sells to 25 percent of the retailers in the county where his or her California brandy wholesale licensed premises are located, or a licensee whose total volume of sales of California brandy to retailers during any 12-month period consists of 50 percent or more of individual sales in quantities of 10 cases or less, shall be conclusively presumed to be selling to retailers generally.
(3) The licensee may sell only one California brandy of one winegrower, which brandy is produced or bottled by the winegrower, or which is produced for, or is produced and packaged for, the winegrower, and is sold under a brand name owned or controlled by the winegrower.
(4) The licensee, under the authority of his or her beer and wine wholesaler’s license, shall stock and offer to sell to retailers a complete product line of California wines of the winegrower whose brandy the licensee handles. A “complete product line” for the purposes of this paragraph means all of the types of wines sold under a particular label.
(b) The number of California brandy wholesaler’s licenses which may be issued shall not be limited by any rule of the department relating to the number which may be issued in any county, nor shall those licenses be included in any formula used by the department in determining the number of distilled spirits wholesaler’s licenses which may be issued in a county.
(c) The fee for a California brandy wholesaler’s license shall be two hundred seventy-six dollars ($276) per year, which shall be deposited in the Alcohol Beverage Control Fund.
(Amended by Stats. 2011, Ch. 296, Sec. 29. (AB 1023) Effective January 1, 2012.)