Don't ban sales of small liquor bottles

My name is B.J. Patel and I have a small liquor store in Arlington Heights. For years we have served the community at our best customer service level.

We are not big enough that we can compare ourselves with Jewel, Dominick's or Binny's or Teddy's. And our customers come to us because of the convenience factor.

Now these single serves and small bottles of alcohol are the backbone of our kind of small business. There are a few homeless people in town who are making problems with littering empty cans and bottles, and I think because of that the Arlington Heights Police Department is trying to implement a ban on these items.

But my concern is what about those people (and I know there are lot more people like that) who don't want to drink a whole case or six-pack or whole bottle of booze.

What about those who want to do only cooking with some recipes, what about those who don't want to or can't spend money to buy a case or a big bottle?

Our business tradition is from Monday to Sunday ... it means starting Monday they try to relax from the weekend and gradually they go toward the weekend by increased buying. Some people who can't afford a big case go for a single serve or smaller quantity.

So now we are trying to feed them more alcohol or maybe we are trying to take that business away from Arlington Heights and give it to neighbor villages.

The village would lose a lot of tax money and maybe that will force us eventually to close our business and that will be more revenue loss for the village.

B.J. Patel

Arlington Heights