Tesco Bans Alcohol Sales to Parents
Having successfully reduced alcohol sales to teenagers, Tesco is now worried about adults who may be making purchases on their behalf. The store’s latest idea is restricting sales to adults accompanied by young people if the cashier thinks they intend to share their purchases with said underage drinkers.
Staff have been told to "err on the side of caution" when interpreting the policy which Tesco believes "any reasonable parent" will understand and support. Some of those who have been stopped are reportedly angry and unsupportive, however.
The Daily Telegraph says parents refused alcohol have described the rule as humiliating and daft. Debbie Bell, 39, a housewife from York, was told she could not buy a crate of lager at a Tesco Extra in the city with her stepson Michael Bruce, 18. "Michael wasn’t even carrying the beer, he was just standing next to me," she told the newspaper.
Dominic Zenden, a television medium, was not allowed to buy six bottles of Budweiser when he was accompanied by his 15-year-old daughter Devon because a cashier refused to believe he was not going to share the drink with his daughter.
According to the report, he was "dumbfounded. There was absolutely no indication that my daughter would be drinking the alcohol -- it was for me. But the woman told me that they don’t sell alcohol to people who have children with them."
A Tesco spokesman admitted to understanding customer frustrations but said the store would rather apologize where it has misjudged the situation than sell to underage drinkers.
Discussion questions: What do you think of Tesco's move not to sell alcohol to parents shopping with their children in a bid to tackle underage drinking? How should grocers handle situations where an adult may be buying alcohol for a minor?