Can we? Everything I understand about the public tells me otherwise.

It does seem weird to me that about 5-10% of a grocery store is bottles of alcohol.

Fluids consume large amounts of shelf space by volume regardless of what fluid it is, not much we can do about this, so a large amount of shelf space does not mean a large percentage of the store's total items, in theory. By percentage of total items, it's likely very small for most supermarkets.

See also the large amount of shelf space typically required to stock bottled water and soft drinks.

The variety of alcohol on offer does seem a tad perverse, in a way that status quo bias renders difficult to perceive. How many brands of bottled water do you usually see? Half a dozen, tops? And much of the volume in that aisle is occupied by huge 16-packs and giant carriers. Meanwhile the average wine aisle has hundreds of different brands, nearly all no more than 75cl, and might even stretch to two aisles in a large supermarket. It dwarfs the available selection of any other category of product. And that's before we get into the bafflingly endless rows of spirits.

Is this a healthy relationship with what is, in the final analysis, an intoxicating drug? If there were an aisle in every supermarket with 10 times as much cannabis as you'd currently find in the average dispensary, would we regard that as equally normal?

Perhaps the difference is I am not baffled; Alcohol is enjoyable in moderation and it is one of the few high margin items in the store. Fluids are popular and take up much more shelf space as noted. As for bottled water, my local Safeway easily carries in excess of 20 brands before we count the huge number of soft drinks too?

I suspect you have not been in a dispensary recently if you think a supermarket would stock 10x as much; the range of products in most US dispensaries is truly enormous now across edibles, waxes, flowers, tinctures etc. I would strongly argue we would see a smaller range of products in the supermarket, should it become legal to sell there. This is exactly like alcohol too, where dedicated booze stores often have a wider range. It would still be significant in size though - lots of people like weed.

I can already barely manage the scented tide in the store. MJ in a grocery store? Stinky.

I don't think the number of brands on offer has any effect on our relationship with booze. It doesn't matter how many brand of yellow mustard are on the shelf, I'm buying it at the same rate. Where I live now, very few super markets have beer/wine and none have spirits. I know I buy less booze now than I did when I lived in places where you could get beer pretty much anywhere, at gas stations, super markets, convenience stores, etc., and it's probably for this reason.

That depends on where you're from. Some states don't allow the private sale of liquor.

Interesting to see where the U.S. stands in this list - https://www.abbeycarefoundation.com/alcohol/alcoholism-by-co...