How Much Does It Cost To Ship Wine – Case & Bottle
Wine Shipping Cost
We all love wine and want to enjoy more of it in the comfort of our own homes, however, how much does it cost to ship wine?
If you’ve ever ordered wine and wondered why the cost of shipping was so high, look no further. All your questions will be answered today.
Depending on the weight of the wine, how much is in the package, the shipping service you use and the location you reside in, the cost of shipping for wine delivery can widely vary.
In California, for example, shipping 2-3 bottles of wine typically costs around $23, while on the East Coast, it costs around $27. For 6-bottle shipments, the prices are higher, with California costing around $33 and the East Coast around $38.
Some wine clubs can offer you free shipping and the price is included in the original price of the wine subscription you choose to buy. Others will automatically give you free shipping if you pay to be a general member of their club. However, some wine clubs whether you subscribe or not, will still make you pay a flat fee to ship wine.
The actual shipping cost of the wine depends on things like whether the destination for the wine can be considered a home or a business, how heavy the box is, and what the discounted rates are.
Some shipping services give you a discount if you opt to receive the package at a later time or sign up to subscribe. if you’ve ever ordered from Amazon for example, you know you can sign up for Amazon Prime and get discounts on shipping and get deliveries faster.
The cost of shipping can also depend on the size and weight of the package, how much wine is in it, what state it goes to and other things as well.
If you are not familiar with wine clubs, feel free to check out our detailed article for more information. Learn more.
Table of Contents
Why It Costs So Much
Shipping wine or anything else for that matter might seem like an easy thing to account for as a customer, however, there’s a lot to take care of and think about when it comes to shipping boxes of wine to the other coast.
There are purchasing costs associated with shipping, such as the price of shipping materials like cardboard boxes and cushioning materials that protect the wine inside like styrofoam.
Packing the wine bottles into the box itself is also something that requires special care and can be deemed as a labor cost as well. Paying a delivery service to manage the packages of wine and ship them out to various regions of the US can cost you money as well.
Shipping wine to a home versus a business affects the cost of shipping too.
When you deliver to an office during typical working hours, the package usually gets dropped off, you give a signature and everything is done. Everyone leaves and goes back to their days and the shipping process is all over. However, when you ship wine to a person’s home it’s a different story.
When you deliver to residential areas, wine shipments will require signatures from adults 21 years or older and cannot simply be left in front of a door. If a package is delivered when nobody is home, shippers will need to take the time to deliver notice and will wait till someone shows up or come back at a later time to attempt to redeliver the package.
Because of the time spent trying to deliver the package, wine stores, and clubs have increased the prices of shipping to try to balance everything out.
Smaller shipments also require higher shipping costs, especially since they often get shipped more frequently, so wine club members are often encouraged to buy in bulk and opt for less frequent shipping to save on shipping costs.
Recommended Read: Can You Bring Wine On a Plane?
Weight
The weight of a bottle can affect the shipping rate too.
Glass wine bottles are typically heavy, unless they are in plastic containers, which results in increased shipping costs due to their weight. This costs more money for you as the customer and for the business owner as well. This is the reason why businesses opt for lighter-weighing bottles and packages and even try to utilize bags and pouches. The shipping price dramatically decreases and it requires a lot less time, work, and energy to pack lighter bottles or transport packaged wine.
Certain types of packaging are also more expensive to use than others when it comes to shipping wine.
Materials such as styrofoam, cardboard, and molded fibers can all have different costs when it comes to packaging wine. Packages that use recycled fibers are often cheaper.
International Shipping
When it comes to international wine, it’s a whole other story. The cost of shipping can greatly increase when you order something from an entirely different continent, and what you pay for shipping also goes into import costs. It goes beyond weight and size concerns. On average, imported wines and other items cost more for shipping than items shipped to other states in the US.
You also need to fill out forms and papers when you ship wine you wouldn’t otherwise need to fill out if you were just sending things locally. Sometimes you may need special permits and licenses, and you have a customs declaration too. Some companies also won’t let you ship internationally.
Different shipping companies charge very different rates too.
Shipping Rates
Some companies can charge flat rates of $20 for all shipping in the US and other companies will charge $40 to ship a package of wine anywhere within their state.
Other companies can charge a surplus amount of money for delivery as well. In Alaska, it might cost $300 to ship 12 wines, and in Michigan, $80. The shipping companies have to account for the fact that the wine is heavy, prone to vibration, and sensitive to both heat and humidity.
Shipping During Extreme Weather
During summer, when the heat can damage the quality of the wine, shipping companies have to account for temperature and use ice packs in wine packages or use refrigerated storage trucks which are also written off as an additional cost.
Many wine companies choose not to ship in extreme heat or cold at all.
This is to make sure the quality of the wine stays good and is not affected by extreme heat or cold.
Warehouses
Some wine clubs choose warehouses to store their wine which can also end up being expensive too.
They have to first rent out the space and pay the initial owner of the warehouse to use the area and then charge customers a small fee to be able to use it. However, the warehouse is a great place to store wine if you don’t have any room at your home and it can sometimes be free or provided at a largely discounted rate depending on if you’re a member of a club or not.
Wine Clubs That Offer Free Shipping
There are some wine clubs out there that ship entirely for free. The wine clubs that ship for free are Plonk Wine Club, Roscioli, Mysa, Wine Access, and WineExpress to name a few.
Wine clubs that also offer free shipping are Naked Wines, the California Wine Club, and Firstleaf.
These wine clubs offer you a large variety of quality wines without making you pay a fortune. They’re also great because they all offer free shipping in some form or another.
Final Words
These are some of the reasons why shipping wine can be so expensive. Don’t let the cost of wine shipping stop you from enjoying your favorite bottle, however. All you need to do is keep in mind a few things.
To save money on shipping make sure to buy your wine in bulk and opt for larger deliveries at a less frequent rate. This will greatly save you the high costs of shipping and also leaves you with bigger quantities of wine at a great time.
It’s up to you to decide whether or not the cost of shipping is worth it. You can always buy from your local wine store and save on shipping costs but you miss out on trying other varieties of wine. Your local wine store might not have as much international variety and just have basic types of wine.
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