The Florida 2COP license
Last verified: August 15, 2026 against 11 primary sources.
The taps are plumbed and the lease clock is running. A 2COP is the license standing between a room full of stock and a room full of paying customers.
The rules for it are not complicated. They are just spread across a statute, a surtax section, a fee chart, and a form last revised in 2013. Here they are in one place.
The short version
A 2COP lets you sell beer and wine two ways at once: poured by the glass to drink there, and sealed to carry out. It costs $168 to $392 a year depending on your county's population. It does not cover liquor.
Getting one means the DBPR ABT-6001 form, fingerprints for everyone with a real stake in the business, and three signatures from three different offices. Budget for those signatures. They are where the calendar actually goes.
What it lets you sell
The state's own words: beer and wine "by the drink or in sealed containers for consumption on or off the premises where sold" (DBPR types of licenses and permits). In practice that is one license doing two jobs. Somebody drinks a glass of wine at your bar. Somebody else buys a sealed six-pack on the way home. Both are covered.
Spirits are not. If a full bar is the plan, the restaurant route is the the 4COP-SFS restaurant license, which trades a size-and-food-revenue test for the right to pour liquor without buying a quota.
What it costs
Bigger county, bigger fee. That is the whole logic of the table.
| License | County population less than 25,000 | County population over 25,000 and less than 50,000 | County population over 50,000 and less than 75,000 | County population over 75,000 and not over 100,000 | County population over 100,000 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2COPBeer and wine, on or off premises | $168 | $224 | $280 | $336 | $392 |
Sources: DBPR annual license fee chart (effective Oct. 1, 2025), DBPR types of licenses and permits, and the statutes themselves: Fla. Stat. 563.02, Fla. Stat. 563.025,Fla. Stat. 564.02, Fla. Stat. 564.025, Fla. Stat. 565.02.
Where the $392 comes from
In a county over 100,000 people the statute sets the fee at $280 (Fla. Stat. 564.02). Then a separate section adds a surtax of 40% on top (Fla. Stat. 564.025). Two statutes, one invoice, and the reason people quote two different numbers for the same license.
$280 base + 40% surtax ($112) = $392 a year. DBPR's fee chart prints that same arithmetic out (DBPR annual license fee chart (effective Oct. 1, 2025)).
The surtax applies in every bracket, and the totals in the table already include it. Miami-Dade, Broward, Orange, Hillsborough, Duval, and Pinellas are all far past 100,000 people, so anywhere in them is the $392 row.
One wrinkle worth knowing before you budget: the brackets run off the state's own population estimates, not the federal census, and DBPR decides which one your invoice lands in. If you want every license type side by side, that's on what a Florida liquor license costs.
What the state actually asks for
Every new alcohol license in Florida starts on the same form, the DBPR ABT-6001. What travels with it (DBPR ABT-6001 application packet):
- The completed DBPR ABT-6001 application
- Payment of $100 or one quarter of the annual license fee, whichever is greater, if you want a temporary license
- Your fingerprint receipt, if it applies to you
- A copy of an arrest disposition, if it applies to you
- Mitigation for moral character, if it applies to you
- Your right of occupancy: a signed lease or deed in the name of the business applying
Fingerprints, and why they come first
The state runs a background check on everyone with a real stake in the business. That is why fingerprints happen before the application rather than after it. The results have to be sitting there when your file is reviewed. DBPR's FAQ says get printed at least five days ahead (DBPR Alcoholic Beverages and Tobacco FAQ).
Who has to go (DBPR ABT-6001 application packet):
- Each sole proprietor
- Officers and directors
- Individual shareholders owning more than one half of 1% of stock in a corporation that is not public
- General partners of a general partnership, and general partners of a limited partnership
- Officers, managing members, or managers of a limited liability company
- Partners of a limited liability partnership
- People who are directly interested in the business and receive money from it
You go in person to a livescan vendor from FDLE's list (FDLE) and give them one number: ORI FL920150Z. That number is what routes your results to the alcohol division. Get it wrong and DBPR simply never receives them, and they warn about exactly this (DBPR fingerprinting page).
Three signatures, three offices
Section 5 of the form has three blocks, and a different office signs each one. Nobody collects them for you. This is the part that turns a two-hour form into a three-week errand.
Zoning approval
Signed by: Your city or county zoning office. The zoning office signs to say the location meets zoning rules for selling alcohol. It is required on every new application. The one exception is a state college or university on state-owned land. DBPR ABT-6001 application packet
Department of Revenue clearance
Signed by: Florida Department of Revenue. The business must be registered for sales and use tax first. Then you email your signed application to the Department of Revenue, which signs to say you are registered and your taxes are paid. The Department of Revenue will not process an application that is incomplete or unsigned. Florida Department of Revenue beverage license approval
Health approval
Signed by: Division of Hotels and Restaurants, the county health authority, or the Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services. This one is required only when people will drink on the premises. If the business serves food, the approval comes from the Division of Hotels and Restaurants. DBPR ABT-6001 application packet
A 2COP means people drinking on your premises, so the health approval applies to you. Package-only licenses like a 1APS or 2APS skip it.
Right of occupancy
The state wants proof you are entitled to be in the building: a signed lease or deed. It has to be in the name of the business applying, not your own name (DBPR ABT-6001 application packet). If the lease says you personally and the application says your LLC, that is a mismatch somebody will catch.
The temporary license: your rent's best friend
Waiting for the permanent license while paying rent is the expensive part of this whole process. Florida sells a way around it (Fla. Stat. 561.181). Once your application is complete on its face and nothing in it looks disqualifying, you can buy a temporary license and start selling.
For a 2COP it is $100 in every county, because a quarter of even the top fee is $98, which falls under the $100 floor (DBPR temporary license fee chart (rev. 05/16/2025)). A temporary license ends when the application is denied, or 14 days after it is approved, or when the permanent license is issued, whichever happens first.
Where people lose weeks
Almost nobody gets refused outright. They get stalled, and always in the same few places.
Paying the wrong county's fee
There are five brackets and a surtax that doubles as a trap. Send $280 because that is the number in the statute and you have underpaid by $112, because the surtax is a separate section you never read (Fla. Stat. 564.025). An application with the wrong payment attached is an application that gets sent back.
Treating the Department of Revenue as someone else's job
The Revenue clearance is not something DBPR requests on your behalf. You register the business for sales and use tax, then you email your signed application to the Department of Revenue and wait for them to sign it. They will not process one that is incomplete or unsigned, and they publish no turnaround time at all (Florida Department of Revenue beverage license approval). People discover this step exists after they have already posted everything else.
Leaving someone off the interested-parties list
The form wants everyone with a stake: officers, directors, shareholders, partners, managers, and the whole ownership structure. It also reaches people who never think of themselves as owners: the friend who guaranteed the lease, the relative who co-signed the loan (DBPR ABT-6001 application packet). Miss one and the picture the state has of your business does not match the paperwork.
Filing it
One more thing to sort before you send anything: two official DBPR sources disagree about whether applications go in online or on paper. Both positions, and the district office list, are on our how to apply page.