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In this blog, every now and then, we talk about how the label and formula system at TTB can be quite slow, despite various TTB efforts to streamline things. Some top examples are here:  101 Days (to get a spirits label approved); Streamlining; Sen. Schumer Says Labels Take Too Long; more streamlining. It is not a pleasure to observe that it can take more than five months to get an ordinary French Vodka approved (30 or so days at the TTB Lab, then 60 or so days to write up the formula approval, then 60 or so days for label approval — to say nothing about potholes and glitches along the way). Add a few weeks if you’d like to add a flavor.

For a change, today let’s give TTB a break and talk about what the submitters can do, to help speed things up. We will also cover what applicants should not do. Many of the same principles apply to both labels and formulas.

Applicants should:

1. Start early. TTB and others do a pretty good job of showing the updated average processing times (APTs), for labels and formulas, so it should come as a surprise to nobody that both processes can take a very long time. Why not...

A short while ago I went to see why “that easy label” is still pending, after filing it while snow was still on the ground and waiting well past spring, into summer. I was shocked* and horrified to see the above. The average processing time for spirits labels is now, as of today, way past a month or two. I am startled to see it’s past 100 days. I don’t recall it ever getting past 45 days or so, back in the days of shutdowns, Rep. Gingrich fighting with President Clinton, Tea Partiers fighting President Obama, and so forth. I find myself talking about the same pending labels, over and over again, week after week and month after month.

It is starting to feel like a crisis for many spirits companies, so far as I can tell. Maybe the big ones can plan around this and tolerate this, but waits of this magnitude are devastating for most companies, from what I can see. Why all of a sudden? Wasn’t the power of the internet and computers, and streamlining, supposed to do approximately the opposite? For those highly interested, we have an internally prepared chart showing how this has gradually or not so gradually gotten worse over the past 7 years. It is available...

TTB has been working on a new COLA form, with new and more flexible rules about what may change without seeking a new label approval. TTB announced this in the January 13, 2012 Newsletter and the Federal Register two weeks prior.

The new rules, if/when implemented, could allow a huge variety of big and small changes — without the need to submit, wait, haggle.

Here is the draft form. For example, the new rules (at page 3) would allow you to:

1. Move mandatory around. This is at category 2. This would allow you to move VODKA from the bottom of the front label to the top of the front label, for example. It would not allow you to move VODKA from the front to the back. (The draft form does not seem to make it clear, about whether it’s also okay to reposition non-mandatory. It would be very strange if okay to move the important stuff but not the less important stuff.)
2. Change colors. This is at category 3.
3. Add/delete/change a QR code. This is at category 22.
4. Add/delete/change social media icons. This is at category 25.
5. Add/delete/change information about awards. This is at category 26. It remains a bad idea to announce  “Award for most antioxidants in a Cabernet.”
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