How do I ship direct to customers?

[natbouman]

The limited distillery license in Pennsylvania now lets me ship directly to customers. They can buy online from me and I can ship the product out. Great! But USPS, UPS, FedEx won't ship liquor. What can I do?

[hiredguns]

Up here in Canada, Purolator seems to be a popular choice among the BC wineries for DTC shipments.

Also, once you're up & running with the DTC, you should look at the "Wine Club" model that a lot of wineries use. Get customers to sign up for a regular shipment (monthly, quarterly, bi-annually... whatever.) Works out well for the wineries... gives them regular, recurring income that they can count on and the cost of each sale drops significantly after that first Club shipment is processed. There are some great website options for handling the ecommerce and order fulfillment part of the equation.

[Natrat]

USPS will ship alcohol, but the receiving party needs to have their age verified. There's a bit of a rigamarole to go through. This was changed last year.

UPS will also ship alcohol, but you need to get a waiver signed by your rep, and have a shipping account set up with their global tracking stuff. It costs a little more because it gets labelled hazardous.

FedEx I have also shipped with, and there is a form to fill out in triplicate each time. Interestingly, once I contracted to freightquote.com, and the LTL load of 3 pallets of whisky was picked up by a FedEx truck.

Also, I have found DHL to be easy to work with on this...you may want to find out if DHL will do pickups in your area.

When I ordered from Leopold Bros, they stuffed a crate full of bottles and shipped it UPS. The tag said "bottle samples."

Good Luck!

[Jedd Haas]

With Fed Ex, you can become a registered alcohol shipper. Then all you have to do is include a certain reference in the shipping label and use a big warning sticker, which they supply.

Be careful about shipping out of state. Every state has different regulations regarding alcohol shipments.

[daveflintstone]

USPS will ship alcohol, but the receiving party needs to have their age verified. There's a bit of a rigamarole to go through. This was changed last year.

This is not correct. I you received written approval to ship alcohol by USPS I'd like to see it.

[TetonDistillery]

Our biggest problem with shipping spirits in small amounts (6 bottles or less) is breakage.

We have special packaging that minimizes the potential for bottles breaking, but it still seems to happen sometimes.

What are you guys using?

[Roger]

Sen Schumer', NY Dem, has put forth a bill to allow the USPS to deliver wine and spirits. Don't know when or if it will make it through the system, but would be good, and add some revenue for the USPS.

[Salishseaorganicliqueurs]

USPS will ship liquor. It just has to come direct from the DSP and someone of age has to sign for it. We have had alcohol shipped to us through USPS from other companies.

[Natrat]

"As the U.S. government looks for ways to save the U.S. Postal Service, a recent bill passed the senate that includes provisions allowing the USPS to ship wine, beer, and spirits. Private carriers have been shipping wine for decades, but the USPS has been banned from doing so for over one hundred years. 18 U.S.C. § 1716(f), the 1909 law that prohibits the USPS from shipping “all spirituous, vinous, malted, fermented or other intoxicating liquors of any kind” remains on the books. That law pre-dates prohibition by ten years, and has never been repealed. That would change if Senate Bill 1789 becomes law. The bill was passed in the senate on April 25, 2012, and Section 405 provides that wine, beer, and distilled spirits are considered “mailable” by the USPS as long as a) it is consistent with the laws of the states where the shipment is initiated and where delivery is to be made, the addressee is at least 21 years of age, and c) the addressee provides a signature and a valid government-issued photo identification upon delivery."

Passed in the House June 2013. USPS is still struggling with putting effective checks in place, and they have not updated their website to reflect the change in the law. Their policy is "don't ask don't tell" until they can deal with it. But it's legal, and lots of us do it.

[daveflintstone]

Well call me a nutter and I'll eat a bug, that is so completely opposite to everything I've been told by USPS that I am flummoxed. My world has been turned upside down, my head hurts. Though that might be all those m&ms.

[jharner1]

Natrat,

Was it signed by the President? Just because it passed both houses of Congress, it does not mean it's the law quite yet. And it doesn't look like it even passed in the House: http://beta.congress.gov/bill/113th-congress/house-bill/630

So no, it is not yet legal for USPS to ship alcohol.

[Natrat]

jharner1, I didn't actually determine each and every step of law...when the change was published in a major beverage magazine, we simply went to our local postmaster and asked him about it. He told us that USPS, as of August last year, can ship alcohol. He elaborated and said that the policy was don't ask, don't tell, and that the forms for determining age verification of the receiver were not yet developed...he also said it would be near impossible to police. I was not present at the meeting with the official, but that's the way it was presented at our staff meeting. The quote above was directly from our minutes.

I am no longer with the company that was mailing the alcohol, but what they did was take a scan of a driver's license, and matched it with the address. If the shipping address wasn't on the license, they wouldn't send it. Then they kept a file with all the info, and stuck the alcohol in the mail...labeled as such. To my knowledge, they shipped about 12 cases during the christmas season...at least according to my final inventories.

So if it's not yet legal, or not yet policy, or not yet public, or not yet published....then some very fishy stuff went on.

But it obviously bears some greater research.

[jharner1]

Sorry Natrat! Didn't mean for that to sound so dickish (though reading it now, it really does). I just wanted to make sure that, even if the Feds look the other way about an archaic, irrational law, folks know it's still the law.

But you're absolutely right - that was some fishy stuff. Even if USPS wanted to update their policies to the 20th century (only one behind!), they definitely can't contradict statutory laws.

[PeteB]

This is an international forum.

Australia Post encourages customers to send alcohol by post, it even sells special wine boxes, especially at Christmas time.

No need for contents identification or receivers ID.