Shipping mead restrictions?

[Descender]

Bottled a cyser today. A friend of mine in North Dakota wants me to send him a bottle. What is the general consensus on this? I've seen other threads regarding the different laws, but can't find them.

 

[whitesheperd]

Shipping alcohol is illegal period.. BUT I know most people that want to ship theirs with UPS and when they ask what does the package contain they tell them it's marinade for chicken. No one has ever ha any issues


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[whitesheperd]

Unless you have your license to sell and ship alcohol. I have had someone ship me a bottle of homemade strawberry wine and everything went perfect.


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[IJesusChrist]

Tell them its a statue, or a barbeque sauce.

 

[fatbloke]

Thanks to the baby kissing arseholes who repealed your 18th, leaving such side issues to state level legislation, USPS refuse to handle it as it seems that its too complicated to manage, thanks to the baby kissers pandering to the whims (take that as meaning votes) of the bible nazis.........

Ergo, like the others say, use UPS/Fedex etc but still lie as to the contents if asked......

There will always be ways of side stepping these dumb shipping regs implemented by different states but it just suggests that bible bashers and politico's don't trust their citizens.

And of course even if you follow the suggested ideas, there's no guarantee of success........

Of course, I can speak with the jaundiced/cynical standpoint. I'm not the one who has to put up with such legislative nonsense ! :shrug:

 

[gratus fermentatio]

I've shipped beer/cider/wine/mead via UPS many times, never had any problems. 99% of the time, they don't even ask what's in the box, if they do, I just tell them it's gifts. Just pack it well & you should be fine. I always put every bottle in a big ziploc bag so that even if it breaks, it shouldn't leak & won't draw any attention.
Regards, GF.

 

[biochemedic]

If you do a search for the 12 Beers of Christmas thread(s), somewhere in the 2012 thread I have some nice pics/tutorial of how I pack for shipping. You might have to modify slightly for a wine bottle if you don't bottle in 12 oz longnecks.

The whole concept of that thread was brewing for trade/swap, and strictly speaking I don't think shipping a friend homebrew is any more illegal than sharing at a homebrew club meeting... If it is, than I would expect it's an offence that wouldn't be chased down too aggressively. USPS specifically has rules about shipping liquids that would supersede the fact that it's beer or mead...still I can tell you that at least of of the 12 Beers brewers used USPS both of the years that I was involved...

 

[thatjonguy]

Send some for me!

Best way is to print the label at home and drop it off at a non-carrier center (e.g. Staples, Office Max).

They never ask, especially if it is all ready to go.

 

[fuelish]

Send some for me!

Best way is to print the label at home and drop it off at a non-carrier center (e.g. Staples, Office Max).

They never ask, especially if it is all ready to go.

Packaged securely, of course .... I might be reluctant to ship a sparkling mead, but still should be no problem with proper packing....well, perhaps I wouldn't do it in the mid- summer heat

 

[Renoun]

I've got a couple more suggestions...

If you are planning ahead when you bottle a plastic soda bottle is going to much more resistant to rough treatment in transit than a glass bottle. You should also review the forecast/likely weather between you and the destination and attempt to avoid extreme heat waves or freezing.

 

[whitesheperd]

Or you could wrap the hell out of it and around it put a few freezer packs in it


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[Alypius]

You can always ship Ground if you're worried about pressure changes. I'm pretty sure that's the primary concern at USPS since a lot of mail is sent via air.