For six years, a customer who discovered a bottle of Paso Robles gin or whiskey on vacation could return home, order another online, and have it delivered to their door.
Come Jan. 1, that could end.
A pandemic-era allowance that lets California craft distilleries ship spirits directly to consumers is set to expire Dec. 31, and an eleventh-hour effort to preserve it appears to have stalled in Sacramento. For Paso Robles distillers, whose businesses depend heavily on tourists, the change could erase as much as 20 to 30 percent of their revenue overnight.
“It’s going to be tough to stay in the black next year,” said Alex Villicana, owner of Re:Find Distillery and Villicana Winery in Paso Robles and president of the California Distillers Association. “We’re going to have to either figure out how to cut back on expenses and staff … days open. I don’t know.”
Direct shipping began as emergency relief during the COVID-19 pandemic, when Gov. Gavin Newsom loosened alcohol regulations as tasting rooms shut down. State lawmakers have repeatedly extended the privilege since then, but the latest extension expires at the end of this year.
What began as a temporary lifeline has, over six years, become part of the business model for distillers such as Aaron Bergh, owner of Calwise Spirits Co. and president of the Paso Robles Distillery Trail, which represents 12 distilleries across San Luis Obispo County.
Paso Robles is particularly exposed to the change because its distilleries operate in a tourism-driven market. A visitor might discover a bottle in a tasting room, Bergh said, then return home to Los Angeles, San Francisco, or San Diego. Direct shipping gives that customer a way to buy more bottles without making another trip to Paso Robles.
Bergh told New Times that Calwise stands to lose roughly 30 percent of its business if shipping ends.
“Over the past six years, we built subscription clubs and online stores that we’ve been depending on,” he said.
Villicana faces much the same problem. Many small distilleries lack statewide distribution, he said, and the large distributors fighting direct shipping often aren’t interested in carrying their products.
“Once that tourist walks into our door, buys our spirit, eventually goes through that bottle, wants to order a new one or get a new one, they have no way to do it other than to drive back up here to Paso Robles,” Villicana said.
Distillers hoped Assembly Bill 2211 could provide a way out.
Authored by Assemblymember Josh Hoover (R-Folsom), AB 2211 would allow craft distilleries to operate a branch tasting room away from their production facility. Hoover sought to amend the bill to make direct-to-consumer shipping permanent, but that language was never formally added. The underlying bill has continued moving through the Legislature.
As negotiations dragged on, craft distillers narrowed their request. Instead of seeking permanent shipping privileges broadly, Villicana said the industry eventually asked lawmakers to grandfather in the roughly 46 distilleries already operating under the temporary shipping program.
Even that failed to gain traction.
The opposition includes alcohol wholesalers and distributors, the Wine Institute, and the Teamsters. CalMatters reported that groups lobbying on AB 2211 spent more than $1 million petitioning state government this year, although state disclosure laws don’t specify how much was spent specifically on the direct-shipping fight. California craft distilleries, by comparison, reported spending $54,000.
With the legislative clock running out, local distillers decided to make their case themselves.
Ten Central Coast distillers traveled to Sacramento on Aug. 17, a trip organized over a single weekend. By Villicana’s count, they visited 37 of the state Senate’s 40 offices in one day.
Getting there came at a cost. Bergh closed Calwise to the public for the day. Another distiller canceled oral surgery to be there, Villicana said.
“Everybody knew how important this was,” he said.
For Bergh, showing up in person was an attempt to put business owners—not lobbyists—at the center of a debate that could determine whether a significant piece of their businesses survive.
“This bill isn’t just lobbyists behind suits,” he said. “This is actual business owners.”
At first, the trip seemed promising. Bergh said legislative staff members became more receptive when they realized the people walking into their offices were distillery owners who had left their businesses behind to come to Sacramento. Villicana said most of the Senate staff members they met with seemed supportive.
Within days, that optimism had faded.
Villicana said the distillers learned that the proposed amendment to preserve direct shipping would not move forward, leaving them without the legislative fix they had traveled to Sacramento seeking—and without a vote that would show where individual lawmakers stood.
“I guess it was also disappointing that … we didn’t get a vote on it,” Villicana said. “I always kind of felt like government was supposed to work kind of for the little guy a little bit. I’ve just been disappointed that it seems to have failed us in this case.”
The potential loss comes at an already difficult time for local distillers.
Villicana said tasting-room traffic has fallen amid a broader slowdown in tourism and alcohol sales. For businesses built around visitors, that makes retaining existing customers—and being able to sell to them once they leave Paso Robles—all the more important.
Re:Find grew out of another part of Paso Robles’ alcohol industry. Villicana entered the wine business in 1993 and opened a winery and tasting room on Adelaida Road in 2001. The distillery came later, as he looked for a way to use grape juice removed during winemaking that otherwise went to waste—sometimes as much as 30 percent of the raw material, he said.
That juice could instead be distilled into vodka, gin, and other spirits, turning what had been a waste product into another business.
Now, Villicana estimates the loss of shipping could wipe out 20 to 30 percent of Re:Find’s revenue. Bergh said surveys of other distillers suggest direct shipping accounts for about 30 percent of business for many of them, though the figure varies by producer.
Villicana said Re:Find has worked with the California Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control throughout that period to meet requirements including age verification, signatures, and the use of common carriers.
Unless lawmakers find another solution before Dec. 31, the infrastructure those distillers spent six years building will lose its purpose.
“To lose this ability to ship after the first of the year is going to be devastating for our businesses,” Villicana said. ∆
Reach Staff Writer Chloë Hodge at chodge@newtimesslo.com.
This article appears in Aug 27 – Sept 3, 2026.
