The 20th Annual Sovos ShipCompliant Wine Summit: Top Takeaways

For 20 years, the Sovos ShipCompliant Wine Summit has been about gathering winery professionals with the authorities and leaders who make the industry move. At this year’s Wine Summit, attendees heard directly from the regulators, attorneys and brand leaders shaping the future of the wine industry. As economic pressures, shifting consumer preferences and more tasting rooms than ever compete for attention, the questions facing wineries today aren’t hypothetical—they’re operational.

This year’s sessions offered a window into how leading wineries are adapting, where legal experts say the gray areas are and why the industry’s most resilient players are rethinking not just how they sell, but who they’re selling to.

People sell to people: A keynote from Clarkson Consulting

As a highly regulated industry, wineries are no strangers to significant business hurdles. Yet the challenges facing beverage alcohol today are at least as numerous and significant, if not more so, than ever. Aging Baby Boomers and younger consumers are focused on moderation and non-alcoholic adult beverages, cannabis, inflation, along with global attention on the health impacts of alcohol. Add to this changing palates and occasions, technology and the pressure of how to connect with digital natives.

Keynote speaker Evan Shirley, an associate partner at Clarkston Consulting’s management and operations practice, spoke about how these factors are shaping the wine market and influencing purchasing decisions, and how savvy wineries can keep pace.

For wineries to keep up, they need to evaluate and adjust in several arenas, including:

1. Know Your Consumer: Use data to deeply understand shifting motivations.
2. Evolve Your Product Strategy: Consider alternative lines or value-tier wines without compromising brand.
3. Modernize the Experience: Think through how you can evolve your approach to loyalty to meet consumers where they are.
4. Highlight Brand Purpose: Sustainability, DEI and community-driven storytelling all resonate with many younger buyers.
5. Leverage Tech: Social and influencer marketing can create immersive experiences, while AI can be used for CRM and guest personalization to amplify human capabilities, not replace them.
6. Maintain Compliance: Wineries that master multi-state DtC shipping compliance can scale more profitably.

As Evan noted: “Amid disruption, wine has enduring cultural, emotional, and sensual value. But it needs to be rearticulated for the new consumer. Think of wine as a story and experience, not just a product, with hospitality as a frontline differentiator.”

Staying ahead of federal regulations with the TTB, California ABC and more

Wineries today are navigating a landscape filled with uncertainty around supply chain, shifting regulations and more. From fluctuating tariffs to evolving state-by-state shipping laws and cuts to the TTB, the regulatory environment is complex and constantly changing.

It was a privilege to have esteemed experts join us at the Sovos Wine Summit to share their invaluable insights on federal and state beverage alcohol regulations. Janelle Christian and Aniko Kasprian from the TTB provided crucial guidance on navigating complex federal compliance requirements, while Robert de Ruyter from the California ABC offered expert perspective on state-level enforcement and regulatory trends. Their participation added incredible depth to the conversation and gave attendees direct access to the knowledge and clarity needed to stay ahead in an evolving industry.

Rounding out the conference was Steve Gross, vice president of state relations at the Wine Institute, with his signature update on regulatory and legislative activities impacting the wine industry, with a focus on direct-to-consumer shipping regulation and what’s on the horizon in the coming months and years.

Looking back, looking ahead

Much has changed since the Wine Summit started two decades ago. Back then, complexity and confusion were the watchwords of DtC shipping, with states applying a hodgepodge of haphazard laws across the country. For most of the country, DtC shipping was prohibited in any form, while other states adopted patchwork fixes that only the most diligent or wonkish of wineries could manage.

With time, patience and tremendous amounts of support from wine makers and wine lovers, along with industry organizations that fought the good fight, like Free the Grapes! and Wine Institute, the laws across the country changed, so that today we are able to enjoy a much different map, where consumers in nearly every state have the ability to purchase and receive shipments directly from their favorite wineries around the country.

That is not to say that the future of the wine industry looks free and breezy. There are real fears and concerns for the future of our industry, such as how to keep up your sales and where growth will come from. To me and our Wine Summit guest speakers, the headwinds we see are not reason to panic, but a call for renewal and reinvigoration.