Orr: UPS, FedEx side with wine in beer battle

Boise retailer has found that out the hard way

By Patrick Orr - porr@idahostatesman.com

 

 Darin Oswald/Idaho Statesman

Brewforia owner Rick Boyd, a Boise-based Internet beer retailer, is shifting the emphasis of his business in retail with his store at 435 N. Milwaukee. Last month, UPS notified Boyd they would no longer deliver customer orders for beer.

Hey, craft beer enthusiasts - how tired are you of society ghettoizing you and your favorite beverage while treating wine drinkers like a better class of people?

 

Prepare to get even more peeved than usual by this story.

 

Boise-based Internet beer retailer Brewforia.com may have to give up the Internet part of the business now that United Parcel Service has decided to stop delivering beer to Brewforia's customers.

 

This is after about 18 months of UPS making beer deliveries to customers in 34 states with no problems, Brewforia owner Rick Boyd said.

 

Everything was cool until UPS told Boyd in October he needed a specific contract to distribute beer to other retailers - even though he was selling directly to customers.

 

By February, UPS reps told him they weren't going to deliver Brewforia products anymore - no matter if a state allows such deliveries direct to consumers or not - and were not going to offer a contract.

 

Not that it would make a difference - UPS' Web site says "UPS does not accept shipments of beer or alcohol for delivery to consumers." UPS does allow direct shipments of wine, however.

 

Boyd said he was open with UPS from the beginning in 2008, telling them exactly what his business entailed. Boyd said UPS reps told him as long as someone of legal drinking age signed for the products, the deliveries were fine.

 

Susan Rosenberg, a spokeswoman for UPS, said if the company was making deliveries for Brewforia, it was in error, because UPS only approves beer deliveries between licensed businesses.

 

"He needs to seek an alternate vendor," Rosenberg said, explaining that once UPS officials determined what Brewforia was doing, they stopped delivery.

 

Boyd is trying to get a deal done with FedEx, but says the same issues remain and doesn't expect to get a contract with them, either.

 

Both companies continue to ship wine for Internet-based wine merchants like Wine.com, however.

 

When asked why UPS will deliver wine and not beer, Rosenberg said "that has just been a policy that we have had. It's a program where our focus has been working with a number of licensed wine shippers."

 

"For right now, UPS has chosen policy where beer contracts are for business-to-business shipments."

 

Rosenberg said the issue is complicated by some states defining wine differently than beer and having different distribution requirements. UPS officials have been working with wine retailers for longer and don't have any immediate plans to revisit their beer policy, Rosenberg said.

 

If you've read those paragraphs and don't really understand UPS' reasoning, join the club.

 

What this is really about is a beer industry that is set up to benefit distributors at the expense of retailers, consumers and brewers. Yes, your local beer distributors, the middlemen who do nothing yet eat up profits and control what beer gets sold where.

 

Can you imagine if the free market was actually allowed to work in the beer industry, where innovation on the part of breweries and retailers would be rewarded? Where a customer could deal directly with the brewer or favorite retailer to buy what they want? Perish the thought!

 

Boyd estimated his losses - from designing the Brewforia Web site and setting up the business that now doesn't work - could be as high as $80,000 before the whole thing is over.

 

"In this kind of economic climate, businesses have to be innovative and take challenges - why punish that?" Boyd said. "(Internet beer retailing) is an active, growing business that creates jobs and tax revenue. Who does this policy benefit?"

 

Thankfully, Boyd has a backup plan - his retail Brewforia store. Opened as a temporary storefront on Milwaukee Street earlier this year to complement the Internet business, Boyd has signed a lease for a permanent specialty beer retail stone at the corner of Eagle and Overland roads.

 

That store - a former Tully's Coffeehouse - will have more refrigerator space for bottles, room for as many as 10 tap handles, and room for people to chill as they shop.

 

Boyd is also developing a Web-based local beer/food delivery service out of the store (which will be called brewforiadelivers.com) where people can order beer and meals to go from up to 10 local restaurants.

 

Boyd hopes the new store and Web site will be up and running by April. While he hopes delivery services like UPS and FedEx change their anti-beer policies, he is dedicated to finding other ways to make his beer business work.

 

"I'm not going down without a fight," Boyd said.