In all but eight states, you can go to a bar during Happy Hour and enjoy discounted prices on drinks, and you can buy carryout alcohol.
Neither of those things are allowed in Indiana, but that changes on Monday.
Indiana was one of a handful of states in the 1980s that banned happy hour, a set time of the day when drink prices are discounted, in an effort to reduce drunk driving. Studies have shown such laws have had no effect on drunk driving rates.
A longtime board member of the Indiana Restaurant and Lodging Association, LaSalle Grill owner Mark McDonnell tried unsuccessfully to get the law changed in 2016. This year in the General Assembly he tried again, but this time he was bolstered by a new awareness of how fragile the restaurant and bar business is since the COVID pandemic.
McDonnell found a willing sponsor in South Bend Republican State Representative Jake Teshka.
McDonnell says LaSalle Grill and its upstairs bar, LaSalle Kitchen & Tavern, won’t likely start selling much carryout, but they do plan to reduce prices on drinks at certain times of the day.
"Anything at this point that will improve our sales, visitorship, or that we can entice them with a discounted drink into having dinner, which offsets the alcohol consumption, to a certain extent, is a good thing," McDonnell said.
