A liquor store with deep roots is on the verge of opening a new location at Trailwinds Village on County Road 466A in Wildwood.
The opening is set for Friday.
Jack Holloway founded ABC Fine Wine & Spirits in 1936 in Orlando. A cigar store manager, he saw the end of Prohibition as an opportunity to expand from cigars into spirits. The original store, Jack’s Friendly Neighborhood Bar, was located in downtown Orlando at the corner of North Orange Avenue and Wall Street. Over the next decade, the company grew slowly to about a half-dozen stores.
In 1950, ABC Liquors was born. Company legend has it that Holloway wanted not only a name that local residents would easily remember, but one that would show up first in the phone book. By 1970, the company maintained not only a growing chain of retail stores, but also an increasing number of attached “lounges” in styles from basic neighborhood watering hole, to (in later years) country and western dance bars and discotheques.
The company took another giant leap forward in the late 1980s, expanding from Central Florida into the northern part of the peninsula with its purchase of Jax Liquors. With approximately 150 locations throughout Florida, ABC became the country’s largest privately owned wine and spirits retailer.
In 1993, ABC Liquors began using the name “ABC Fine Wine & Spirits” in some of its larger locations to highlight the expanded wine selection. Over the past decade, ABC Fine Wine & Spirits has focused on carefully managing its growth; selectively locating new stores, closing some older locations, and remodeling existing structures.
There is also an ABC store on U.S. Hwy. 27/441 in Lady Lake.
