Funny that the UPS thread popped up… I need to ship some wine across state lines ASAP and I’d love some advice on how best to do so. Legally would be nice, too.
My parameters: I am in MD; I have an office in DC so I can ship from there if that helps. I am not ITB. I have friends who are ITB; haven’t yet asked them if they can help, mostly because I’d like to handle this on my own if I can and not be a mooch/risk getting them in trouble.
I have attempted to ship wine once via FedEx and let’s just say it didn’t go well. Didn’t tell them it was wine. Fortunately, the wine was returned to me unscathed and nothing more than a slap on the wrist.
1.) You can’t legally ship alcohol, but we all do it. Trick is to remove ANY trace that it is a wine shipment and eliminate all styrofoam “squeaky” sounds or bottles moving around. Depending on how much wine and size of box, you can also double box.
2.) Get an UPS or FedEx account if you don’t already have one and print your own labels. That way you can just drop off and go.
EDITED to add: I have my wife drop off boxes to ship as unfortunately both the UPS and FedEx people know me as the wine pick-up guy. Don’t want to ever give them a reason to ask/look in the box.
I wrap the bottles in bubble wrap before putting them into the styro. I tape the styro shut and put a piece of newsprint between the styro and cardboard. No squeak. If I am being particulrly paranoid I put the shipper into a larger box in order to disguise it.
Some shipping stores will ship wine but that may just be a California perk since we have so many producers here.
It is a California perk. The FedEx/mail/USPS/UPS/copy and office supply store near me has a big sign in the window - “We Ship Wine”. You can line the styro with bubble wrap or paper to stop the squeaking but as long as the box doesn’t say “alcohol” on it, I’ve never had a problem.
I’ve dropped off boxes at the FedEx hub and the girl behind the counter who I always drop packages off to took them and said “You can’t ship wine.” as she brought them in back to be processed. They know what a shipper looks like whether it says alcohol on it or not. Just an FYI. Relationships matter.
True. Or they don’t. I never bothered to hide what I was shipping in NYC. They just didn’t care. There’s something to be said for lazy, indifferent, uninvolved, uncaring clerks! I asked only once at a UPS store. The guy looked at me, cleared his throat, and said “Huh?”
BTW Mike - some friends used to write “samples” or “perishable” or “olive oil” or something like that because people also ship juices and health drinks, etc. Brian’s right that they know what a wine carrier looks like but other stuff gets shipped the same way - I got one yesterday from Garagiste and it was his highly touted truffle olive oil.
How many UPS/FedEx packages do you get where the sender writes on the outside of the box what is enclosed? Never? Unless of course they are trying to disguise the contents. Normlly shipments are plain unmarked packages that don’t give thieves any ideas.
