Rights to Shoreline's Three Liquor Stores Auctioned Off

The Washington State Liquor Control Board (WSLCB) successfully auctioned the rights to apply for a spirits retail liquor license at 167 state-run liquor stores statewide. The sum of individual bids totaled $30.75 million, with rights awarded to 121 individual successful bidders. Online bidding ended in a flurry of bidding on its final day, April 20, 2012.

The winning bidders in Shoreline were:

•Belay Gebreselasse of Seattle, who paid $220,100 for the rights to store .

•Ezra Genauer of Bellevue, who paid $97,100 for the rights to the .

•Solomon Drare of Ellensburg, who paid $130,100 for the rights to the store #128 at Ballinger Village, 20154 Ballinger Way N.E. 

Initiative 1183 directed the WSLCB to auction the state store properties at their current location. However, the state leases the properties, not owns, creating a unique circumstance for the auction.

Successful bidders earned the exclusive right to apply for a liquor license at the current location within its current footprint. All state store properties are below the 10,000 square foot threshold established by the initiative. Successful bidders will need to secure a lease with the property landlord. If they are unable to secure a lease, they may re-sell their right or request an alternative location within a one-mile radius of the existing location.

The state liquor stores will close June 1st and 14 employees in Shoreline will be losing their jobs. 

Information from the Washington Liquor Control Board was used in this story.