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According to an article at Wine-Searcher.com, TTB’s Industry Outreach office indicates that TTB had about 520 employees last year, and has about 450 today, due to two rounds of “voluntary resignations”.
This reduction in staffing levels has already led to extended permit approval times – average DSP permit approvals are running at 81 days (April 2025). This exceeds the “customer service standard” that TTB aims for of 75 days. It’s worth remembering that these are averages, and some permits take significantly shorter or longer to be approved.
Long-term, TTB will either have to find new efficiencies, or else average processing times for formulas, labels and permits will increase. This is a small-scale tragedy: folks who remember the “bad old days” know that TTB processing times used to be up in the stratosphere. Since 2019-2020, they’ve made significant strides in reducing these delays. It’s unfortunate that we’re now moving in the opposite direction.
What’s the takeaway? Allow extra time for activities that require TTB approval, including:
- New Permits
- Permit Amendments (including adding Transfer in Bond applications)
- COLAs (Labels)
- Formulas
We’ll see if TTB can leverage AI or other tools to “do more with less”, or if the industry is going to go backwards.
