Operation Swill: Numerous NJ Bars & Restaurants, Including Many TGI Fridays, Busted For Substituting Top Scotch With Rubbing Alchohol

OPERATION SWILL – Only in Jersey!!!

Talk about your consumer fraud. Twenty-nine New Jersey bars and restaurants, including 13 TGI Fridays, have been accused of substituting cheep booze, and in some cases rubbing alcohol and worse, for top-shelf brands while charging premium prices. RUBBING ALCOHOL?!? There is some good PR for TGIF, NOT! According to the Attorney General Jeffrey Chiesa, Operation Swill, investigators collected 1,000 open bottles of vodka, gin, rum, scotch, whiskey and tequila from the wells of the bars. I guess we now know what the Soprano’s have been up to since last seeing Tony with his family in a NJ diner. On a larger level, Doug Ross has hit the nail on the proverbial head, “Chains like T.G.I. Friday’s that engaged in the practice, franchises notwithstanding, will have to prove they’re doing the right thing on a national basis.”

T.F.I.F may be changing their name to T.G.I.T.S.A … Thank God It’s Top Shelf Alcohol. On a personal note, I have actually been in 3 or 4 of those TGIF’s in the past. Great, I a was drinking beer, or was it?

At one bar, a mixture that included rubbing alcohol and caramel coloring was sold as scotch. In another, premium liquor bottles were refilled with water – and apparently not even clean water at that.

State officials provided those new details Thursday on raids they conducted a day earlier as part of a yearlong investigation dubbed Operation Swill.

Twenty-nine New Jersey bars and restaurants, including 13 TGI Fridays, were accused of substituting cheap booze – or worse – for top-shelf brands while charging premium prices.

As part of Operation Swill, investigators collected 1,000 open bottles of vodka, gin, rum, scotch, whiskey and tequila from the wells of the bars, state Attorney General Jeffrey Chiesa said.

‘This alleged scheme is a dishonest ruse to increase profits and is a slap in the face of the consumer,’ Chiesa said.

Within seven days, the establishments must turn over records to help state authorities determine how many patrons were overcharged and by how much.