SF Liquor Licenses Plunge in Price

San Francisco’s market for full liquor licenses has dropped to about $100,000 for some restaurant permits, down from roughly $230,000 in the first quarter of 2022, according to reporting by the San Francisco Chronicle and accounts from license broker Cameron DeRuosi. The decline has hit an asset that restaurant owners long treated as a backstop because the city’s supply of full on-sale licenses was tightly constrained for decades. Thad Vogler, the former owner of Bar Agricole and other San Francisco restaurants, told the Chronicle the value of his licenses fell from around $250,000 each to about $110,000 after the pandemic. The drop comes as San Francisco and California have also opened new paths for alcohol sales downtown and in entertainment zones. ### Why did a San Francisco liquor license used to cost so much? California has long limited the number of on-sale general licenses that can be issued based on county population, and San Francisco’s constrained supply pushed buyers into the resale market. The Chronicle, as cited by Yahoo Finance, reported that Type 47 restaurant licenses in the city effectively functioned as scarce assets because the quota system did not expand enough to meet demand. (finance.yahoo.com) SF.gov said in October 2025 that state law had capped the number of liquor licenses available in San Francisco for nearly 80 years, forcing new restaurants and entertainment venues to pay high secondary-market prices. The California Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control says on-sale general licenses authorize the sale of beer, wine and distilled spirits for consumption on the premises, and its fee schedules distinguish between application fees and the market price businesses may pay to acquire or transfer a scarce license. In San Francisco, that market price became the larger cost. ### How far have prices fallen? (finance.yahoo.com) Cameron DeRuosi told the Chronicle that San Francisco Type 47 licenses averaged $230,000 in the first quarter of 2022 and $95,000 by the end of 2025. SFist, citing the Chronicle, reported on May 20 that those licenses were trading around $100,000 and that the late-2025 low was about $95,000. Thad Vogler told the Chronicle that the licenses he once viewed as insurance lost much of that value when his businesses closed. “The price of a liquor license is an index of what people believe about San Francisco and the restaurant industry,” Vogler said, according to the Chronicle. “They’ve stayed down. (abc.ca.gov) They’re not going up.” (finance.yahoo.com) ### What is pushing values lower now? The pandemic-era restaurant shakeout started the decline, and DeRuosi told the Chronicle the market has not recovered to earlier levels even after business conditions improved from 2021 lows. The Chronicle said the decline reflects continuing pressure on restaurants from inflation, labor costs and weaker alcohol consumption, all of which reduce demand for expensive full-liquor permits. (finance.yahoo.com) State and local policy changes have also added lower-cost alternatives in some parts of the city. Senate Bill 395, signed on October 7, 2025, authorizes up to 20 additional new original on-sale general licenses for bona fide public eating places in a designated San Francisco retail district, according to the bill text and Mayor Daniel Lurie’s office. Those licenses are separate from the older secondary-market permits that had commanded six-figure resale prices. (finance.yahoo.com) ### Are these the same as the new downtown licenses? SB 395 applies to up to 20 additional new original licenses for restaurants in a designated downtown district, not to the citywide pool of older transferable licenses that owners have bought and sold for years. The bill says San Francisco must adopt or modify a local ordinance designating the district, and that ordinance takes effect on the following July 1. The law also bars those licenses from being transferred from one county to another. (legiscan.com) Mayor Daniel Lurie said when Newsom signed the bill that the law would allow San Francisco to issue up to 20 new liquor licenses downtown. State Senator Scott Wiener, the bill’s author, said the measure would help new businesses get lower-cost licenses in the Union Square and Yerba Buena area. ### How do entertainment zones fit into this? (legiscan.com) San Francisco’s entertainment zones are a separate policy tool. SF.gov says those zones let participating bars, restaurants, wineries and breweries sell alcoholic drinks to-go during certain hours for outdoor consumption in plazas, sidewalks or streets tied to programming. They expand where and how licensed businesses can sell drinks, but they are not the same thing as issuing a new full liquor license. (sf.gov) On May 16, 2025, Mayor Lurie signed legislation creating five new entertainment zones across San Francisco, according to SF.gov’s entertainment zone page. Those zones are part of the city’s broader nightlife and downtown recovery effort alongside the separate SB 395 license program. ### What happens next for operators? October 7, 2025, is the date SB 395 was signed, but the bill text says San Francisco still needs a local ordinance designating or modifying the retail district before the Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control can issue those additional licenses. (sf.gov) The ordinance becomes effective the following July 1, according to the law. For existing owners, the secondary market remains active, with recent reported prices near $95,000 to $100,000 for Type 47 licenses in San Francisco. (legiscan.com)