Mike Thomas has done just about everything around the family business, Thomas Liquors, including being ordered into the cooler with his dad, Jim Thomas, while a not-so-friendly “visitor” dipped into the cash register. That was in 1975, and Mike Thomas has progressed from cleaning the store’s parking lot to running the business alongside a team of well-versed staff members. “I’ve been here practically my whole life,” he says. “I know nothing else.”
After graduating from the University of St. Thomas, Thomas went to work full time at the store in 1985. “We were the keg pros,” he recalls, noting the Grand Avenue store was and is surrounded by colleges and universities. Once the state’s drinking age bumped up from 18 to 19, and eventually to 21, he recalls thinking, “There goes our business.” A liquor sales representative suggested the store develop itself into a wine shop. “We started small,” Thomas says. He and the salesman visited area wine shops to glean information about creating Thomas Liquors’ own wine niche.
Today, that niche has grown into featuring a significant wine collection, along with craft beer and spirits selections. “It’s constantly space management,” Thomas says of the growing inventory. He also stands by the store’s commitment to quality, using this analogy: “You can get salmon at any grocery store, but if you want Copper River salmon, you come here.” The selections are backed up by the staff’s industry knowledge. Peter Vars, a certified sommelier, is said to have one of the best wine palates in the Twin Cities, according to Thomas. Joe Fitzpatrick, beer manager, hosts Fitty’s First Friday, where craft or standard beers get their night in the spotlight. The website often lists several staff recommendations.
“You couldn’t ask for a better selection, and if they don’t have it, they’ll get it for you,” says longtime customer Tom Lee. He considers Thomas Liquors a triple threat—product, customer service, and community commitment. “They epitomize what is good about local businesses,” he says.
Thomas Liquors could be a considered a model of entrepreneurial evolution. The site opened in 1922 as Rosedale Pharmacy, owned by Fred Munch. Clarence Thomas, grandfather of Mike and father of Jim, worked at the store and later purchased it in the late 1920s from Munch’s widow. It reemerged as Thomas Pharmacy, where, in addition to pharmaceuticals, whiskey was sold by prescription only. (It was Prohibition.) Once the law was repealed in 1934, Clarence received one of the original off-sale liquor licenses in St. Paul, according to Jim Thomas. “He had a lot of customers who bought alcohol by prescription who could now buy” via retail, Jim says. “It was a natural transition for the pharmacy to apply for an off-sale license.”
By the 1950s, more liquor consumption was taking place in homes, away from the traditional watering holes and gathering spots at local bars and restaurants. This gave rise to the liquor store business. Jim says a purchase flip began to occur. Where once 80 percent of liquor sales occurred on site, with the remaining to off-sale purchases, the figures swapped spots. By 1951, Thomas Pharmacy rolled into Thomas Liquors. Jim began his tenure at the store in 1958, later dropping out of St. Thomas to tend to the family business full time due to his father’s illness.
The Thomas family business has survived changes in liquor laws and customers’ consumption styles, all while defying the odds. According to the Family Business Institute, a national organization based in North Carolina, only about 30 percent of family businesses survive into the second generation, 12 percent are still viable into the third generation and only about 3 percent of all family businesses operate into the fourth generation or beyond.
Don’t count this family out just yet. With three children of his own, Mike doesn’t ask “if.” Instead he asks, “Who’s going to be the next Thomas to take over?”
