The reason was that the town’s only grocery store will be closed until mid-November due to redevelopment, and that the municipalities would have alcohol sales in the municipality while it is closed.
Now the State Administrator in Trøndelag has come to the conclusion that the decision is invalid. The reason is that in Norway it is not allowed to sell alcohol in petrol stations or kiosks.
– We had feared this, but we hoped for something else, says Terje Lillesand who is the owner of the petrol station to NRK.
He says there are many places in the country that legally sell both groceries and beer. Therefore, he believes it is wrong that he is not allowed to sell alcohol because the company is registered as a gas station in the unit register.
– It will be such a huge mistake to use the law. It is clear that kiosks and petrol stations should not sell beer, we have got that with us, but it is the definition of petrol station that is wrong, Lillesand believes.
Terje Lillesand, Best Børsa.
Photo: Magnus Kjøren Berg / NRK
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He justifies the claim with the fact that smaller and smaller car items are being sold, and more and more grocery items at petrol stations.
– Electric cars should only have washer fluid, and the grocery stores sell that just beating as well, he says and continues:
– The law is so old that it is completely useless.
Can not give permission
The state administrator was asked by a municipal council representative to carry out a legality check after the decision was made.
– We share the administration’s assessments that Best Børsa is to be regarded as just a petrol station, and it is not open for sale of beer at petrol stations in Norway, says acting municipal director Kjetil Ollestad at the State Administrator in Trøndelag on their websites.
Considering other solutions
The case must now be processed by the municipality again. Terje Lillesand hopes the politicians will be able to find an opportunity for them to still be allowed to sell beer.
– We also take hold and consider other ways of selling beer. There is something called online and “pick-up point”. If we do not get through with this now, then we will look at the possibilities around it.
– Will it be beer anyway?
– I think the grocery chains are favored when you see what has happened to petrol stations and what we sell. When you get to buy the same thing through the doors of a grocery store and a so-called petrol station, there is a bit of misuse of the law, I think, Lillesand concludes.
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