The new law preserves pandemic-era takeout and delivery privileges for qualifying businesses, with a 16-ounce limit on mixed cocktails and existing age-verification rules for third-party delivery.
MORRISTOWN, NJ – New Jersey restaurants and bars can permanently continue selling cocktails to go under a law signed by Gov. Mikie Sherrill on Friday, Aug. 28, preserving a temporary policy adopted during the COVID-19 pandemic that the governor’s office said was scheduled to expire Sept. 1.
The new law, S4384, takes effect immediately and applies to holders of plenary retail consumption licenses, qualifying hotel or motel consumption licenses and seasonal retail consumption licenses. For eligible Morristown restaurants and bars, the change means the existing takeout option can continue without the approaching expiration.
The permanent rules distinguish between alcohol that can be picked up at a licensed business and alcohol that can be delivered to a customer’s home.
Qualifying licensees may sell alcoholic beverages on their premises for off-premises consumption in original containers or other closed and sealed containers. They may also sell mixed drinks made with distilled spirits in closed and sealed containers.
For delivery, the law permits a licensee or a licensed third-party delivery service to bring sealed mixed cocktails and malt beverages, including beer and products such as hard seltzer, directly to a New Jersey residence where the consumer is at least 21 years old. Other alcoholic beverages cannot be delivered in their original containers under this section of the law.
Mixed cocktails sold or delivered outside their original containers must have a tamper-evident seal and cannot exceed 16 fluid ounces.
“New Jersey’s small businesses shouldn’t have to navigate outdated rules just to serve their customers and grow,” said Governor Sherrill. “Cocktails to-go worked, customers liked it, and small businesses told us it was another way to bring in revenue. Today, we’re making it permanent.”
Delivery still comes with age and handoff restrictions
New Jersey already regulates third-party alcohol delivery through a system created by the Division of Alcoholic Beverage Control in 2022, and making cocktails to go permanent does not remove those safeguards.
Under the ABC rules governing licensed third-party services, delivery workers must receive alcohol-compliance training and verify that the recipient is at least 21. The customer must sign for the order, and alcohol cannot be left unattended as a no-contact delivery. Drivers also cannot deliver alcohol to a person who appears intoxicated.
Third-party deliveries generally must go to a residence rather than a hotel room, office or BYOB restaurant, and alcohol deliveries are prohibited on college and university campuses. Delivery also must occur during hours when the originating licensed business is legally permitted to sell alcohol.
Those rules grew out of a broader shift in New Jersey alcohol law during and after the pandemic. Gov. Phil Murphy signed the original cocktails-to-go legislation in May 2020, when restrictions on indoor dining had sharply limited restaurant and bar operations. ABC subsequently issued guidance defining acceptable sealed containers and limiting mixed cocktails to 16 ounces.
New Jersey later established the third-party alcohol delivery permit, allowing licensed services to deliver on behalf of restaurants, bars and other authorized retailers while requiring background checks, training, records and age verification.
Craft distilleries gain permanent takeout privileges, but the final bill narrowed delivery
S4384 also makes several temporary privileges permanent for New Jersey craft distilleries.
A craft distillery may sell mixed drinks on its premises using distilled spirits manufactured there. Those drinks can be consumed at the distillery or sold in sealed containers for customers to take away. Off-premises mixed drinks are subject to the same 16-ounce maximum and tamper-evident seal requirement.
Distilleries may also sell their own spirits in original containers together with nonalcoholic drinks or food ingredients that a customer can combine to make a cocktail. The food component must be an ingredient for the mixed drink rather than a separate meal.
The final legislative text is narrower on direct delivery by alcohol manufacturers than earlier versions of the bill.
Provisions that would have newly allowed limited breweries, certain wineries, cideries and meaderies, and craft distilleries to deliver their own products directly to New Jersey residences were removed when the Senate Budget and Appropriations Committee amended the bill on June 28. The deleted craft-distillery provision would have authorized delivery in the distillery’s own vehicle to consumers 21 or older. That language does not appear as an operative provision in the version passed by both houses.
The permanent law instead clearly gives craft distilleries the right to make the specified sales on the licensed premises for off-premises consumption. Existing portions of state law also continue to state that a craft distillery license does not permit direct shipment of distilled spirits.
That distinction is more limited than the governor’s press release, which describes the legislation as giving craft distillery licensees the ability to “sell and deliver their products for off-premises consumption under select conditions.”
The consumer figures cited by the state come from a national survey
The Sherrill administration cited National Restaurant Association figures showing that 79% of wine drinkers, 77% of beer drinkers and 74% of cocktail drinkers said the ability to order alcohol with restaurant delivery would make them more likely to choose one restaurant over another.
Those figures come from a 2023 National Restaurant Association report, rather than New Jersey-specific sales data. The survey covered adults 21 and older who had ordered restaurant delivery during the previous six months. Across all respondents in that group, 54% said alcohol availability would make them more likely to select one restaurant over a similar competitor for delivery.
More recent industry data published by the association in 2024 found that among full-service restaurants selling alcohol, roughly half included alcohol with delivery orders, while 93% of restaurants offering alcohol to go made it available for pickup.
S4384 was introduced June 1 by Sens. Vin Gopal and Declan O’Scanlon, with Assemblywomen Luanne Peterpaul and Rosaura “Rosy” Bagolie as primary sponsors and Assemblywoman Katie Brennan as a co-sponsor. The Senate passed the measure 40-0 on June 30, followed by an 78-1-0 Assembly vote the same day.
The law took effect upon Sherrill’s signature Friday, meaning qualifying restaurants and bars can continue offering cocktails to go beyond the expiration date identified by the administration. Businesses remain subject to state alcoholic-beverage laws, ABC regulations and applicable local rules governing alcohol sales and consumption.