How to Purchase Beer in Pennsylvania

Thanks to my non beer related day job, I found myself 30 minutes South of Pittsburgh, PA last week in a small town called Canonsburg.  As I usually do when travelling, I ventured out to look for places to buy craft beer that I can't get back in Texas, but this time I got some first-hand experience with the peculiar beer laws in Pennsylvania.  Basically, there are limitations on your purchase depending on the type of beer store you're in.  Shop at a beer store that's a beer distributor (which looks like a regular beer store) and you're only able to purchase beer by the case.  No sixpacks and no mix and match. You have to buy a case of 24 of whatever you're interested in. That might be okay if you're stocking up for the holidays or for the big game on Sunday, but not convenient when looking for individual craft beers to bring home.  Fortunately, after driving past several more beer distributors, I stumbled across a bottle shop where you can purchase sixpacks and single bottles of different beers.  However, the limitation here is that the total volume purchased has to be less then 192 ounces which equals sixteen 12oz bottles.  You can make multiple trips in and out of the store with 16 bottles each time, but each transaction is limited to 192 ounces.  You definitely need to plan your beer purchases in that state.

The bottle shop that I eventually found is called Guntown Beer which apparently has the largest beer selection in the area and all available as singles.  The owner was very helpful at pointing out the locally brewed craft beers that I probably hadn't heard of or tried.  I enjoyed about half of the singles that I purchased over the next couple of days and packed the rest in my suitcase.  Here's a few shots of the beer selection in Guntown Beer and the beer that I purchased:

Its good to see that there are still a few states out there that have even more bizarre liquor laws then Texas.