A rant about shipping hooch

Because it only took Viking-Sensei three years (and the approaching end of Errant Story) to come up with a better name for "General Discussions"
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Sareth
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A rant about shipping hooch

Post by Sareth »

[Rant]

So I do a little home brewing, and had an excellent idea. Why not lay down a holiday mead, then ship bottles of it to my friends as Christmas presents? A nice, tasty holiday treat! And it's completely legal according to federal law. Yes, there are a few counties and municipalities here and there that have prohibition still in effect, but none of my friends live in them.

Here's the problem. The Postal Service won't ship alcohol at all. And both FedEx and UPS require you to be a licensed commercial winery or brewer in possession of a license to sell alcohol in the target state. So as long as I want to pay all the fees needed to get licensed like, oh, say, BUDWEISER they'd be happy to ship my stuff. But try to send some one a personally hand crafted bottle made specifically with them in mind and I am shit out of luck unless I lie about the contents of the package.

I'm not conspiracy theorist enough to think the big booze industry is trying to stamp us out. But seriously FedEx? UPS? You'll ship it for people that fork out thousands annually to SELL this stuff in bulk, why can't you give a break to us hobbyists who want to just share with our friends?

[/rant]
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Pancho Villa
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Re: A rant about shipping hooch

Post by Pancho Villa »

Its mostly a liability thing, I think, along with local rules being so varied.

In addition, and correct me if I'm wrong, but home brewing is perfectly legal, but brewing and selling without a license is illegal, correct? I would think that UPS/Fedex would avoid that just to avoid being mixed up with that. I have a few friends who sell under the table.
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Sareth
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Re: A rant about shipping hooch

Post by Sareth »

Yeah, you pretty much got it. Still a pain.
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