We confiscate and display your fake IDs for Newport and the world to gawk and laugh at…plus you might get arrested.

For whatever reason, Newport, RI is swimming in fake Connecticut licenses. As a result, Bridge Liquors is swimming in fake IDs because we know how to spot them and our employees are taking them like it’s going out of style. We’re just running out of ideas of how to deter this behavior.

Imagine that you’re a 19-year old who’s just got their fake ID straight from the Internet. You call up all your friends and they give you a dream list of everything they’ve heard about or tried at a party one time. So you stroll into Bridge, playing it cool as you, a college-aged male, pick up five bottles of different flavored Smirnoff Vodka, a six pack of Mike’s Hard Half-And-Half and a 12 pack of Not Your Father’s Root Beer. Then you put it all on the counter that looks like this:

That’s right, it’s a graveyard for youthful bravado. Do you think “Maybe I should drop this stuff and get out of here”?

Of course not, because you spent the last 20 minutes in the parking lot, psyching yourself up for this moment and you figure as long as you show no fear, you’ll be golden.

Unfortunately, your drink selection alone had you flagged before you even put it on the counter. Hell, the 15 minutes it took you to decide on which whipped cream vodka you wanted was a red flag. We understand that sometimes our of-age customers have a hard time making decisions about their purchase, but never when they ultimately decide on a vodka that’s likely the same flavor as their girlfriend’s lip gloss.

So the cashier is already thinking “I’m going to card the hell out of this guy…”

The Fake ID is presented

So you drop your load on the counter and have your ID ready for when our guy asks for it. He takes a look at it and laughs, then shows it to the second cashier, who glances at you. “What’s your birthday?” they ask you.

Your response starts with “Ummm…” as you try to remember what year would actually make you 21 and if it was that year or if you made it so you were 22.

“Yeah, we can’t sell you this. This ID is fake.” There it is. Denial.

But maybe you can recover with some of that youthful bluster. “No, it’s real!”

“Okay, you say it is, we say it isn’t. Let’s have the Newport Police decide.”

This is when your head and shoulders drop and you meekly walk out of the liquor store, defeated and out of your fake ID.

Yeah, yeah…we know you ship you them three at a time, but you can’t be that stupid to try to use your other two fakes at Bridge Liquors again. That would mean that we’d have two of the same IDs to show all our customers who’d laugh at you at least four times as hard as they do the rest.

This in Newport, where liquor licenses are a lot more valuable than they are most other places. That means that most owners guard theirs a bit more jealously than at whatever college town you’re coming in from. Anyhow, we’re not interested in making your underage drinking our business.

Come back when you’re 21 and have decent taste in alcohol.

Oh, and one more thing…

We love it when kids have their fathers try to come in and get their IDs taken down. It’s almost like no one in your family can conceive of how the process works. You did the crime, do the time.

Long story short, maybe try texting older people and have them buy for you. See how that works out.

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