AmericanWinery.com

• Does it cost anything to join AmericanWinery.com?
• How can I reach someone to help me setup my account or answer more questions?
• Can I sell my wine through AmericanWinery.com?
• How do I make changes to my Virtual Tasting Room?
• What if I’ve forgotten my password to log in?
• Do I have to sell my wine through AmericanWinery.com to have a Virtual Tasting Room?
• Is this an exclusive arrangement? Can I sell my wine through other outlets?
• How do I receive payment?
• Does AmericanWinery.com take a commission?
• Does AmericanWinery.com ship my wine for me?
• Is this a secure site?
• Can I ship wine to any location?
• Can you ship to a P.O. box?
• Is sales tax applied?
• Can orders be taken anytime?
• How are shipping fees calculated?
• Can I offer special discounts? By case, shipping or special offers?
• How much time do I have to fulfill an order?
• How are orders tracked?
• What if I can’t fill an order or my wines are out of stock?
• What is your return policy?
• What is a Shipping Advisory, and how does it affect my wine shipments?
• When a Shipping Advisory is posted on AmericanWinery.com, how long do I have to fulfill AW orders?
• During periods of Adverse Weather, can I hold AmericanWinery.com orders until the weather improves?
• Can orders be upgraded from ground shipping to Expedited Shipping during the summer and winter months?
• What does the Expedited Shipping fee cover?
• What if the customer doesn’t want to upgrade?
• Can a customer override a Weather Hold that I’ve placed on an order?

Q: Does it cost anything to join AmericanWinery.com?Top

A: It’s completely free to join. Create a profile and launch your winery on AmericanWinery.com with no strings attached! We host all your information at no charge to you. Simply upload your information and update content as often as you like. There are no monthly or annual fees, and no hidden costs. If you choose to sell your wine through the Consumer Direct Marketplace we take a 10% commission on the selling price of the wine, which means your winery keeps 90% of the sale.

Q: How can I reach someone to help me set up my account or answer more questions?Top

A: Please email us at winerysupport@americanwinery.com. You can even reach real people by calling us at 1-888-ENOLOGY, Monday through Friday 9-5 Pacific Standard Time

Q: Can I sell my wine through AmericanWinery.com?Top

A: Yes, we can facilitate the sale of your wines direct to consumers. When you sell your wines through our website you enter into an agreement to process and ship your orders as they arrive. Our policy is very straight forward. We market your wine and find buyers, we collect the funds, and transmit the order to you or your fulfillment house. You are responsible for packaging and shipping the wine via UPS, FedEx, or DHL. We then invoice and distribute funds to your winery once a month. The details are explained to a greater extent during the enrollment process.

Q: How do I make changes to my Virtual Tasting Room?Top

A: Simply log into your account and click on your winery name to be taken to your Winery Control Panel. Updates are easy and instantaneous, so feel free to update your profile as much as you’d like!

Q: What if I’ve forgotten my password to log in?Top

A: If you have forgotten your password, we offer a password retrieval system near the login area. If you need further assistance please email winerysupport@americanwinery.com and include “login trouble” in the subject line.

Q: Do I have to sell my wine through AmericanWinery.com to have a Virtual Tasting Room?Top

A: No, selling wine through our website is not a requirement – but it’s a great benefit! You can simply promote your wines through our free service and post your winery details for our thousands of visitors to see.

Q: Is this an exclusive arrangement? Can I sell my wine through other outlets?Top

A: We do not require exclusivity. We think the beauty of owning an American business is the opportunity to market your product in as many venues as you choose!

Q: How do I receive payment?Top

A: AmericanWinery.com will pay your winery on or near the fifth of the month for the previous month’s successfully fulfilled orders. For example, if your winery does $3,000 in sales through AmericanWinery.com in November, your winery will receive funds for that month on or near December fifth. The amount of funds will include total sales minus AmericanWinery.com’s commission, plus shipping costs (Shipping), and plus taxes that were collected.

Payment is remitted to you via an ACH (direct) deposit to the account you designate. If you are unable to receive payments in this method, please contact us as soon as possible to make arrangements for paper checks.

Q: Does AmericanWinery.com take a commission?Top

A: AmericanWinery.com collects a modest marketing fee based on the selling price of the wine which can be viewed HERE. This commission pays our credit card processing fees, funds marketing efforts to sell your wine, and is used to employ a trained customer service staff for consumers. This high volume sales model allows us to take such a low commission. In other arrangements you may be losing upwards of 40-50% of the retail value of your wine. At AmericanWinery.com, our goal is to help your winery succeed and sell more wine for more profit, direct to consumer.

Q: Does AmericanWinery.com ship my wine for me?Top

A: Our service facilitates the purchase of wine, and orders are drop shipped from each winery directly to the consumer. AmericanWinery.com does not stock any wine at our location, nor do we hold wines that are purchased through our site. AmericanWinery.com will administrate order processing, payment transactions and provide tracking information to customers on your behalf. Shipping the wine in a timely manner is your responsibility.

Q: Is this a secure site?Top

A: AmericanWinery.com is a secure site. We respect your privacy and consider security an extremely important issue. We will never share personal information with outside parties, our site uses the most advanced SSL encryption technology and we do not store credit card information on our web server. We are an affiliate member, recognized by the following groups: affiliate member, recognized by the following groups:

• The Better Business Bureau (http://www.bbb.org)
• Verisign (http://www.verisign.com/index.html)
• Trust-E (http://www.truste.org/)
• Hacker Safe (http://hackersafe.com/)

ABOUT SSL CERTIFICATES

Age Verification

Q: Can I ship wine to any location?Top

A: Due to various state laws, wineries are restricted from shipping wine directly to some states. AmericanWinery.com would like you to stay compliant with state shipping laws, and therefore allow you the ability to choose all the states you are able to ship to in the sign up process. If you need to adjust the states you will ship to, you may do so at anytime within your Winery Store Admin Area.

Q: Can you ship to a P.O. box?Top

A: We cannot facilitate shipment to P.O. boxes. An adult, 21 years or older, must be present to sign for each shipment; UPS, FedEx and DHL do require proper identification. To avoid unnecessary delays and complications during transit and delivery, we suggest customers use a business address, or make arrangements for an adult to be present at the delivery location.

Q: Is sales tax applied?Top

A: All orders are fulfilled directly from your winery or warehouse. Ship Compliant will feed the accurate and up-to-date tax calculations for orders purchased through the AmericanWinery.com Consumer Direct Marketplace. This information will auto-populate the tax field in the shopping cart transaction via software integration provided by Ship Compliant.

Q: Can orders be taken anytime?Top

A: Consumers may buy wine on our site 24/7 365 days a year. We will submit orders to you during business hours. Our office hours of operation are Monday through Friday 9 to 5 pm Pacific Standard Time.

Q: How are shipping fees calculated?Top

A: AmericanWinery.com has simplified shipping costs for wine buyers by adopting a universal shipping fee schedule. At this time AmericanWinery.com offers ground shipping or expedited shipping fulfilled by UPS, FedEx or DHL, depending on your preference. Shipping Fees are determined as follows:

STANDARD SHIPPING:
1-3 bottles per winery $15
4-6 bottles per winery $20
7-12 bottles per winery $25

$2 for every additional bottle after 12 bottles from the same winery.

EXPEDITED SHIPPING
1-3 bottles per winery $45
4-6 bottles per winery $55
7-12 bottles per winery $65

$4 for every additional bottle after 12 bottles from the same winery

These numbers have been calculated by taking an average of shipping costs for sending wine shipments across the United States. Sometimes the real cost may be a little more, sometimes a little less, however, it has been documented that high shipping prices for buying wine online is a negative factor limiting the number of consumers buying wine online. Having a standardized shipping program helps with this as consumers always know they can come to AmericanWinery.com to buy a case of wine from a winery and the price will be fixed. Shipping charges may change at anytime, and if they do your winery will be notified.

Here’s an example how standard shipping charges are calculated from the consumer’s perspective.

If you order 6 bottles from one winery, and three bottles from another, your shipping would be calculated as follows: 6 bottles from winery A = $20, 3 bottles from winery B = $15, your total shipping charges would equal $35.

However, if you ordered nine bottles from one winery your shipping would only cost $25.

Q: Can I offer special discounts? By case, shipping or special offers?Top

A: AmericanWinery.com encourages wineries to offer discounts. Wineries may choose to offer volume discounts, special pricing for quick sales, as well as offer one cent on case purchases! By retaining such a high percentage of profit in the end, we encourage wineries to utilize these features, as it will lead to increased sales. AmericanWinery.com takes the 10% marketing fee out of the sale price of your wine, so if you sell your wine for less, we take less as well.

Q: How much time do I have to fulfill an order?Top

A: Unless there is a Shipping Advisory (see Shipping Advisory), our partner wineries agree to ship orders within two business days of the date of purchase. If lack of inventory or other administrative reasons prevent you from shipping your order within the forth day of business it will be considered canceled and your customer will receive a full refund plus a credit to be applied to their next AmericanWinery.com purchase. As soon as an order is shipped and you have given us the tracking numbers, we pass tracking information on to customers via email. Wineries must ship via UPS, FedEx, or DHL, depending on their preference.

Q: How are orders tracked?Top

A: When an order is shipped, you must provide tracking numbers to AmericanWinery.com through a simple interface. We manage all the communication to customers and send email notifications of tracking updates when each portion of their order ships. Customers can also check order status by logging in to their account.

Q: What if I can’t fill an order or my wines are out of stock?Top

A: We work closely with our winery partners to assure information is accurate and up-to-date. If a winery is unable to complete a shipment or wine becomes out of stock during the order-processing period, AmericanWinery.com customer service reps can resolve this matter by issuing a refund. You can also elect to ‘turn-off’ your e-commerce function at anytime if you will be prevented from being able to fulfill orders for a period of time. When you do this all the wines remain on the site but the purchasing ability is taken away. The marketing benefits remain.

Q: What is your return policy?Top

A: Just as with any online wine purchase, we cannot accept returns for customer remorse. Many of our wines are rated and reviewed so as to provide customers with as much information as possible to make an informed buying decision. Of course, should there be a problem with any order including shipping and fulfillment errors, we will correct the problem as quickly as possible. We work with you to determine the source of the problem and issue refunds accordingly.

Q: What is a Shipping Advisory, and how does it affect my wine shipments?Top

A: During the summer and winter months, AmericanWinery.com will post a site-wide Shipping Advisory to notify our customers and our winery clients that adverse weather may affect wine shipments.

Q: When a Shipping Advisory is posted on AmericanWinery.com, how long do I have to fulfill AW orders?Top

A: During periods of Adverse Weather, your winery will have 5 business days to fulfill orders from AmericanWinery.com. This means that if an AW order comes through on a Monday, you have until the following Monday to ship the order. If your orders are not affected by extreme temperatures, simply fulfill the order as you would normally do.

Q: During periods of Adverse Weather, can I hold AmericanWinery.com orders until the weather improves?Top

A: If you are concerned that adverse weather conditions may affect the shipment of any AmericanWinery.com order, you may elect to place a Weather Hold on the shipment. Orders may be placed on Weather Hold for up to 28 days while you wait for conditions to improve. An AmericanWinery.com representative will contact the customer to inform them of the weather hold.

Q: Can orders be upgraded from ground shipping to Expedited Shipping during the summer and winter months?Top

A: Absolutely. Expedited Shipping is our recommended shipping option during Adverse Weather conditions, as it provides our customers the opportunity to receive their wine in the safest and most timely manner. If you request that the order be upgraded to Expedited Shipping, an AmericanWinery.com representative will contact the customer to inform them of the situation and offer them the Expedited Shipping for an additional fee. If the customer chooses to upgrade to Expedited Shipping, you will then have 2 business days to fulfill the order.

Q: What does the Expedited Shipping fee cover?Top

A: The Expedited Shipping Fee covers 2-day Air or Overnight delivery of the order, depending on your preference with regard to the weather.

Q: What if the customer doesn’t want to upgrade?Top

A: If the customer does not wish to upgrade their shipment from Standard to Expedited, the order will be placed on Weather Hold for up to 28 days while you wait for conditions to improve.

Q: Can a customer override a Weather Hold that I’ve placed on an order?Top

A: In rare circumstances, a customer may elect to override a Weather Hold and have the wine shipped via ground service at their own risk. If an order is released from Weather Hold at the customer’s request, AmericanWinery.com, its partner wineries and associated couriers are not responsible for any damage to the wine due to extreme temperatures, and will not replace damaged items at our expense.