States and cities are ever more aggressively governing how consumer-facing companies operate. Retailers, restaurants, hotels, convenience stores, and consumer goods manufacturers may sell different products, but there are thousands of bills and ordinances every year that have a common impact on their operations and bottom lines. Minimum wage and scheduling rules, sales and excise taxes, packaging and labeling requirements, pricing and fee disclosure laws, retail theft penalties, and age-restricted product regulations are a few examples.
The result is a patchwork: 50 different state rules, with local ordinances layered on top. Each variation adds compliance cost. And that’s just current law — every session brings new proposals that could add more.
Poor policy also has a tendency to spread. A proposal that is enacted in one state gets copied by lawmakers and advocacy groups in the next, and a single state law can become a template for the rest. By the time an idea reaches your largest market, it has momentum and a track record behind it. The companies that fare best engage early, while a proposal is still taking shape.
MultiState has worked with retail, hospitality, restaurant, convenience store, and consumer goods clients for decades, and our Consumer Industry practice brings that experience together under one team. We represent Fortune 500 brands and small businesses, along with the trade associations that speak for the industry. Our staff includes professionals who have worked inside retail and hospitality associations, run 50-state issue campaigns for retailers, led state and local advocacy programs for hotel owners and operators, and tracked labor and employment and business tax policy for multistate employers. They’ve seen and navigated these issues from the client’s side of the table.
MultiState’s team understands the issues, knows the key players and organizations, and we harness that expertise to help our clients effectively navigate and engage on their policy priorities. We offer customized strategic solutions to help you develop and execute a proactive multistate agenda focused on your company’s goals. Our experts identify and monitor legislation to ensure your organization stays ahead of emerging trends. We regularly engage with state and local policymakers in each state and at a national level to help them understand the intricacies and minutia of our client’s needs. We understand that different industries have different, and at times divergent, goals. Our team is ready to work with you to provide an early warning system that identifies threats to your business and develop strategies and execute tactics to ensure you’re continually positioned for long-term success. Our consumer policy team partners with our network of over 2,000 lobbyists strategically located throughout the United States.
Every client receives legislative tracking services and analyst support. A MultiState expert will become your dedicated analyst, and you’ll receive regular updates on newly introduced, moving, and enrolled legislation tied to your consumer policy issues. Many of the rules that affect your locations start in city halls and county offices, so we can also add monitoring across more than 5,000 local jurisdictions.
MultiState can help you understand and analyze the legislation and policy that affects your organization. Our team can help you explain those effects to your executive team, your operations and finance leaders, your franchisees, or your members. We can also help navigate media inquiries related to your consumer policy priorities.
MultiState can support your efforts to communicate your organization’s consumer policy priorities externally. For example, we can create advocacy collateral such as lobbying leave-behinds, letters to lawmakers, presentation slides, legislative testimony, talking points, and position statements. We can support your direct public policy advocacy by writing white papers or media pieces, speaking at public policy conferences, testifying in state legislatures, or engaging with public policy groups. If you need a more comprehensive solution, we can design and execute a full advocacy campaign to advance your consumer policy goals.
Lawmakers pay attention to the employers in their districts. We help you identify the general managers, store operators, franchise owners, and local business groups who can describe how a proposal would work in their community. We also help you bring those voices together with trade associations and coalitions around shared priorities, so policymakers hear from the people who run the locations and not only from a lobbyist.
Know before you go. Our industry-leading lobbying compliance services ensure our clients’ federal, state, and local registration and reporting requirements are managed effectively and efficiently. Our personalized service means that you will never miss a critical compliance deadline.
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