A Buyer’s Guide to DtC Alcohol Shipping Compliance Software

Choosing the right solution for your business

Introduction

With rising ecommerce demands and more people than ever before working remotely, direct-to-consumer (DtC) shipping of beverage alcohol has also grown in popularity. Consumers have become accustomed to being able to have their favorite wines, beers and spirits shipped directly to their front door. Producers, shippers and retailers are all working toward maintaining DtC compliance, but it’s hardly an intuitive process, especially as businesses grow and regulatory landscapes change. 

Whether you’re a large-scale winery expanding into new states, or a small-scale distillery growing its product line, you’ve come to the realization that maintaining DtC shipping compliance is no easy feat. You understand what you need to do, but perhaps aren’t sure the best way to go about doing it. Is investing in DtC shipping compliance software even necessary? 

Not making that investment could cost your organization time and money—especially if you are shipping to more than a couple of states or to states with complex rules and reporting requirements. Maybe you have one employee dedicating days every single month to trying to account for all state requirements. What happens if you catch a mistake? Do you ship the product out, knowing you’ll get fined after the fact? Or do you delay the shipment, leading to unhappy customers? 

The cost of “doing nothing” can be immense, which is why we’ve outlined how to find the right DtC alcohol shipping compliance software. 

DtC shipping laws vary from state to state, meaning that producers need to keep current on how much they are shipping (to manage against customer aggregate volume limits), to whom (i.e., do you have age verification measures? Are you avoiding shipping to dry counties?) and ensuring the appropriate taxes are determined, collected and submitted. Additionally, the regulations vary by product—just because a state allows DtC wine shipping, does not guarantee that it allows DtC beer shipping, for example. 

Non-compliance can lead to: 

  • Cease and desist letters 
  • Fines and/or monetary penalties 
  • Revoked/non-renewed licenses

•  If you lose one license, it could affect others, including a production license 

Whether you’re a producer, shipper or retailer, it’s critical to know where you’re shipping. From there, understanding—and adhering to—those destination states’ regulations is necessary. But as companies expand into new territories, grow their product lines or scale their business in another way, it’s not always easy to keep tabs on what’s required. That is where DtC alcohol shipping compliance software can be beneficial. 

Most DtC shippers end up deciding between sticking to manual processes or utilizing compliance software. Here’s a look at how the two approaches compare, and what to look for if you decide to adopt compliance software. 

 

Manual processes 

  • How are new laws found and tracked?

Usually one employee, or a small team, is tasked with keeping pace with the latest regulations. Tracking might take place in binders, notebooks or a series of unwieldy spreadsheets that may or may not allow for multiple-employee access. 

  • What is the license, product registration and renewals process?

Employees are responsible for keeping track of which states different products are registered in, what the current fees and required paperwork are, and when critical renewal deadlines are coming up. If renewals for licenses and/or products are missed, you will be unable to sell into that particular state. 

  • How long is setup/implementation?

There is no real “implementation” process, but employee training when there is turnover or an outage could take time, depending on how much manual work is required. 

  • How are compliance checks handled?

Manually, often after the sale rather than in real-time, or—most riskily—not at all. 

  • What is the process for determining, reporting and remitting taxes?

This likely falls to one employee, or a small team for hours of cumbersome paperwork. With such variation in tax rates by state and even municipality, and how taxes are often applied differently for alcohol versus general merchandise, the opportunity for error is high. 

  • What is the employee burden?

Depending on the number of states a business ships into and how many products must be accounted for, the burden could be very heavy. Employees may be required to devote up to several days per month toward compliance. Of course, some companies outsource all of these tasks to consultants or similar providers—for a fee, which can often exceed the cost of an automated software solution on an ongoing basis. 

DtC alcohol shipping compliance software 

  • How are new laws found and tracked?

Rule and regulation updates at all levels (federal, state, other jurisdictions such as county) are kept up to date by a team of regulatory experts. 

  • What is the license, product registration and renewals process? 

A centralized database, visible to all team members, houses all state licensing and federal and state product registration information. The system can send proactive renewal reminders starting months in advance of the renewal deadline, to allow plenty of time for taking action. Renewal and registration requirements are kept up to date at all times by a team of regulatory experts. 

  • How long is setup/implementation? 

Ideally, the DtC shipping compliance software implementation process should have your organization up and running in a matter of weeks so that you can quickly gain value from using the software. Look for a solution that offers a dedicated implementation team who will help guide you through account set up and use. 

  • How are compliance checks handled? 

Automatically and in real time at the point of sale via integration with your ecommerce platform. In some cases, non-compliant orders maybe be flagged for adjustment or cancellation before a customer completes an order. Otherwise, orders should be quarantined for review and action by the team so that no risky non-compliant orders are completed. 

  • What is the process for determining, reporting and remitting taxes?

Again, look for automated, real-time tax determination that is both alcohol-specific and as granular as the rooftop level, as in some jurisdictions, tax rates can vary from one side of the street to the other. 

  • What is the employee burden?

While managing compliance and reporting still requires employee time and attention, expect to save hours—possibly days—per month on compliance and reporting work. Expect employees to experience greater job satisfaction in working with a streamlined, modern compliance solution versus inefficient and time-consuming manual processes that are subject to human error. 

Review your internal processes to determine what the best, most reliable option will be for your business. Remember to account for any future growth plans as well—a single employee handling compliance may work for operating in one territory, but expanding beyond that could become time-consuming, more difficult to maintain and more prone to human error. 

Great ideas can come to life when even one person has the will to help make them possible. Ensure that you have buy-in from internal stakeholders and budget authority to make an investment in DtC shipping compliance software a reality. 

Keep these questions in mind when accounting for budget and buy-in: 

Budget 

  • Is the timing right?

Make sure your business isn’t compromising key objectives—the timing may never be perfect, but working with the right partner can mean reaping time-saving benefits within the first month of implementation. 

  • What are we spending now?

Remember that the cost of doing nothing could outweigh the initial upfront costs of DtC shipping compliance software. The cost of a solution could quickly be recouped from avoiding fines and having employees gain time back to refocus on other key business initiatives that will drive additional revenue. 

  • What will the overall cost be?

The right partner works with your budget and can scale with you as your business grows. Different companies have different needs, and the right DtC shipping compliance software can meet requirements at all levels of production. Tiered pricing options that evolve with the scope of your business are often a good fit. 

 

Buy-in

  • Who needs to be on board?

Your team should understand how the right solution can reduce risk, centralize processes and help gain efficiency. Even one key person acting as a liaison and project champion can create ongoing success. 

  • What are key concerns?

Look for a solution provider that offers a dedicated implementation team, unlimited free support from experts and continued education on the software, all of which can help ensure that utilizing a new solution is seamless from implementation and beyond. 

Conclusion: Why Sovos ShipCompliant? 

Working with a trusted industry partner can help ensure that your business stays current and compliant in all DtC processes, including license management, production requirements and tax determination and reporting. Utilizing a centralized cloud-based platform that is integrated with major DtC ecommerce, point-of-sale and fulfillment systems, you can rest assured that you’re mitigating risk by staying compliant. 

Additionally, the right partner has an implementation process that gets your organization online in weeks—not months. A dedicated implementation team can also ensure you know the necessary information to set up your account, while also letting you have visibility into the compliance process. 

“We decided to go with ShipCompliant thanks to the integrations it has with our fulfillment partner, allowing us to automatically pass orders from our website through ShipCompliant, to our warehouse, which then fulfills and ships the orders. We could also receive the tracking information back through ShipCompliant, making the process much easier for all parties and bringing a level of automation we did not have previously.”

Vegan Wines

“We absolutely fell in love with the idea of how [ShipCompliant] managed the DtC compliance process. Then we found software that would work with it, not the other way around. We were up and running within a month and humming along just perfectly normal within a quarter. ShipCompliant makes it possible to do our job and we can trust that [their] information is accurate. You just can’t put a price on customer satisfaction and peace of mind.”

Moshin Vineyards

“ShipCompliant is an indispensable tool for our company. As a growing business, we recognized early on the need for an all-inclusive compliance software system. ShipCompliant not only met these needs but exceeded expectations by adding the DtC module. DtC is a great way to build our brand following and the integration was seamless.”

Sovos ShipCompliant can help in the compliance process, allowing you to experience fully compliant, accurate and seamless DtC shipping management.

Learn How

4 Signals Your Business Is Ready for Distribution Compliance & Management Software

How do you know when it’s time to adopt wholesale distribution compliance software? Here are 4 considerations to help you decide.

What to Expect When Implementing Wholesale Distribution Compliance Software

Introduction

Implementing wholesale distribution compliance software is no small feat, but it doesn’t have to be a difficult experience. By understanding the implementation process, you’ll feel confident and ready to make the switch and finally streamline state registrations, state reporting, distributor management and more.

Key considerations when implementing new compliance software 

What do you need to keep in mind before getting your three-tier compliance in order using a software solution? Here are some things to think about, based on what we’ve learned by helping 2,000+ clients get a handle on their brand registrations, state gallonage reporting and so many other facets of their business.

  • Buy-in from internal stakeholders: A team that fully understands how a software solution can reduce risk, centralize processes and help gain efficiency is a team that will help drive the project to the finish line.
  • Right timing for the business: Don’t let perfect be the enemy of good. While there’s no just-right time to make changes in any business, choose a time that doesn’t conflict with your organizational objectives. Don’t compromise success by starting the process during a period where you don’t have resources to devote to getting set up. And keep your eyes on the prize: Many of our customers see time-saving benefits within the first month of their implementation.
  • A point person: Having someone available to work closely with your ShipCompliant implementation consultant will speed up the process and help you meet project milestones. This liaison can provide updates and insight into the implementation process, offering visibility to your organization.

 

Working with Sovos ShipCompliant 

It generally takes a few training sessions  to get up and running with Sovos ShipCompliant Market Ready or 3-Tier Reporting. You will be asked to share required as well as recommended data that will help to effectively utilize ShipCompliant’s wholesale reporting offering. Your implementation consultant is always available to explain how your data will be utilized to generate complete and accurate state reports and registrations or to answer any questions about the process.

Sovos ShipCompliant helps get your products to market efficiently by pre-populating required fields and supporting documents so you can submit them automatically. By directly integrating with government systems, your state registration filings are expedited, and all held in one place.

In sum, what can you expect when onboarding with Sovos ShipCompliant?

  • World-class software: Our secure, cloud-based software can be accessed from anywhere and is updated centrally, so you never have to deal with inconvenient manual software updates.
  • A customizable solution that fits your needs: Collaborate with your account executive to understand what solution(s) meet the unique needs of your business. We’ll work together to design a set of solutions that includes everything you need. 
  • A team dedicated to your company: Your dedicated implementation consultant will guide you through setting up your customized ShipCompliant account.
  • Support when you need it: Enjoy unlimited free support from a team of specialists available by phone or email. You’ll also have the ability to browse our expansive Help library for self-serve troubleshooting.

  • Continued education: Our educational experts share best practices in our regularly scheduled customer training sessions and webinars. Tune in live or access our on-demand webinars at your leisure.

Take Action

If you’re ready to experience fully accurate, compliant and seamless wholesale distribution management,

Talk to our experts today

What to Expect When Implementing DtC Shipping Compliance Software

Introduction

Implementing a new direct-to-consumer (DtC) shipping compliance software solution may sound like a stressful experience, but it doesn’t have to be. By understanding the implementation process, you’ll feel better prepared to make the switch. 

Key considerations when implementing new compliance software 

What do you need to keep in mind before getting your compliance in order using a software solution? Here are some things to think about, based on what we’ve seen in our 15+ years of helping clients get a handle on their compliance. 

  • Buy-in from internal stakeholders: A team that fully understands how a software solution can reduce risk, centralize processes and help gain efficiency is a team that drives the project forward. 
  • Right timing for the business: Don’t let perfect be the enemy of good. Choose a time that doesn’t conflict with your business objectives. Don’t compromise success by starting the process during a period where you don’t have the resources to devote to getting it set up. And keep in mind that while there’s no perfect time to make changes in any business, our clients report seeing time-saving benefits within the first month of their implementation. 
  • A point person: Having someone available to work closely with your implementation consultant will speed up the process and help you meet project milestones. This liaison can provide updates and insight into the implementation process, offering visibility to your organization. 

Working with Sovos ShipCompliant 

Sovos ShipCompliant’s implementation process was designed to bring your organization online in a matter of weeks, so that you can quickly experience the value of using the software. You’ll be paired with a dedicated implementation consultant who will let you know what information is needed to get your account set up and why, giving you visibility into the compliance process. 

This includes a set-up checklist to help gather the data required to perform compliance checks, calculate tax rates and ready tax returns to report on each of your DtC orders. After you’ve shared all necessary information for the states you sell to, you can rely on ShipCompliant to ensure compliance everywhere you do business, every time. 

In sum, what can you expect when onboarding with Sovos ShipCompliant?

  • World-class software: Experience real-time compliance checks and alcohol-specific rooftop-level tax determination for seamless operations. Our secure, cloud-based solution is accessible from anywhere and never requires cumbersome manual software updates. 
  • A fully customized solution: Collaborate with your account executive to understand what solution(s) meet the unique needs of your business. We’ll work together to design a set of solutions that includes everything you need. 
  • A team dedicated to you: Work with a dedicated implementation consultant to guide you through setting up your customized ShipCompliant account. 
  • Support when you need it: Enjoy unlimited free support from a team of specialists available by phone or email. You’ll also have access to our robust Help library for self-serve troubleshooting. 

  • Continued education: Join our regularly scheduled webinars and customer training sessions to stay up to date on the regulatory landscape your business faces. Our educational experts share best practices for seamless usage of Sovos ShipCompliant products. 

 

Implementing a new DtC shipping compliance software takes time, but the ShipCompliant team is dedicated to delivering value to your company from day one. With Sovos ShipCompliant, your DtC shipping compliance software is built by a team of experts with your company’s goals in mind. Our team is ready to help you get set up with a streamlined and automated DtC shipping compliance solution that will give you peace of mind. 

Take Action

Are you ready to experience fully compliant, accurate and seamless DtC shipping management?

Talk to our experts today

Get to Know Our Integrated Partners

Video conversations featuring Sovos ShipCompliant integrated technology partners talking about their products and our integration

One important way Sovos ShipCompliant enables efficiencies for our clients is by being connected to the most commonly-used technology platforms in the beverage alcohol industry. Our expansive network of integrated tech partners — 60+ and growing — allows ShipCompliant customers to enjoy seamless operations via integrations spanning ecommerce, front end and point of sale (POS) systems to ERPs and fulfilment houses, from carriers to even state agencies — all integrated with our robust compliance solutions.


Our integrated partners are industry-leading software and on-premise solutions with which we’ve created direct integrations for real-time, alcohol-specific tax rates, compliance checks, order data and product SKU syncs.This allows different systems to “talk” to each other seamlessly.

Why do integrations matter?

Integrated technology platforms help eliminate time-consuming work, like transferring data from one system to the next, saving aggravation and minimizing the risk of human error. The time saved allows users to focus on other priorities within the business.

Meet the partners

The informal conversations featured in these videos are meant to explain in straightforward terms what each company offers and how their integration with Sovos ShipCompliant solutions works. We hope you find these chats helpful. You can also search for integrated partners by name, product type or integration level (e.g., platinum, certified) on our Integrated Partners page.

Partner Spotlight Video Series

Meet Bloom

Build on top of Shopify’s best-in-class e-commerce platform, Bloom provides everything a growing winery needs to sell online and manage their club memberships.

Meet VineSpring

VineSpring enables wineries, breweries and distilleries to manage ecommerce and club customers, orders, products, and inventory from any web-enabled device. VineSpring is a Sovos ShipCompliant Platinum Certified Partner.

Meet Sovos ShipCompliant!

This one-minute video provides a quick introduction to our compliance and reporting solutions for wineries, breweries, distilleries, cideries, distributors, importers and other members of the beverage alcohol industry.

Delivery Management Software

A loyalty-building customer experience may start in your tasting room or on your website, but it doesn’t end there—certainly not if you’re working with ShipCompliant Delivery Experience tools to manage your direct-to-consumer shipping process.

License Management for Wineries

With this cloud-based delivery management software, you can:

  • Improve first-attempt delivery rates
  • Drive customer loyalty and improve reorder rate
  • Build customer satisfaction through customized email communications at key shipment milestones
  • Minimize expensive, frustrating returns
  • Measure your fulfillment performance to identify areas of improvement

Curious to learn more about how Delivery Experience provides all of the benefits described here? Take a peek at these mini demos—a series of six short videos that offer a detailed look at the different components of our delivery management software, including a quick overview, getting to know the dashboard, unshipped packages and en route views, email tools, and performance metrics.

Delivery Experience: Overview


An introduction to Sovos ShipCompliant’s delivery management software capabilities and what they can do to strengthen your DtC shipping processes

Delivery Experience: Dashboard


A look at DEX’s shipping command post, which provides visibility into the entire shipping process, from before a package goes out to after it is delivered

Delivery Experience: Unshipped Packages


How Sovos ShipCompliant’s delivery management software surfaces key order information before shipping to ensure nothing gets held up

Delivery Experience: En Route View


A look at how Sovos ShipCompliant’s delivery management software displays where all packages are in the shipping process in real-time

Delivery Experience: Email Communication Tools


An overview of how DEX’s automated and manual custom-branded email tools help you keep customers up-to-date on their shipments

Delivery Experience: Performance Metrics


How Sovos ShipCompliant’s delivery management software analyzes your DtC shipping return rate, delivery rate, and other shipping performance metrics, along with NPS

Want to see what Delivery Experience can do for you?

Request a Demo