Jim Gordon wrote about this in the Editor's letter column in the June issue of Wines and Vines. HR 1161 was called HR 5034 in the last session of Congress this year it is called HR 1161 or Community Alcohol Regulatory Effectiveness (CARE). According to Jim Gordon, HR 1161 would strip away Commerce Clause protections that allow regulated interstate shipment of wine to consumers, upend decades of settled case law and undermine federal authority over alcohol.
We don't make any wine yet, so we don't direct ship to our consumers. But when we visited a few local wineries earlier this year, the take home message for startups like us was to ensure that we had a viable market strategy. We learned that the profit margin for selling wine is best when people buy directly from the winery, whether it is at the tasting room or via direct shipping. When selling to a local restaurant, the profit margin is not very good because our wine would be competing with other wines so to incentivize the restaurant owner, the wine needs to be as reasonable as the winery can manage and still make some profit.
Some online articles to read include:
Wines & Vines June 2011 There is a video of Jim Gordon explaining what HR 1161 is about.
Wine Spectator March 2011
No comments:
Post a Comment