Many statistical reports are showing that alcohol sales growth in the United States is slowing down. In this modern world, consumers have access to a lot of information, places to make a purchase, and products available. This makes it difficult to even bigger companies to stay ahead in the alcohol business.

However, for the past few years, online liquor sales are showing considerable growth. In 2017, online alcohol sales in the United States reached $1.7 billion. Online liquor stores are making huge profits as people started to buy liquor online.

There are several e-commerce channels that alcohol brands can use to facilitate their growth. Let’s take a look at some of the important ones.

Online Grocery

According to many reports, online grocery will become the leading platform for online alcohol sales within a few years. Currently, online grocery accounts for 5% of total online alcohol sales. When grocers such as Walmart and Kroger develop their e-commerce capabilities and start selling alcohol online, alcohol sales will have significant growth.

Reports are saying that online stores will have a great impact on wine and beer sales too, but the sale of spirits might not have that much impact because many states restrict spirit sales in supermarkets.

Online Specialty Retailers

Even though retailers are facing difficulties in shipping alcohol across state lines because of the varying alcohol regulations in different states, online alcohol retailers are still experiencing steady growth. Statistics show that in 2017, alcohol sales from online specialty retailers reached $975 million. A major part of this revenue has been driven by online wine stores because the wine shipping laws are not as strict as the shipping laws of beer and spirits.

Direct To Consumer

In 2017, direct-to-consumer alcohol sales reached $410 million. Most of the leading wineries in the country are improving their online retail game. Direct to consumer model companies like Winc and Naked Wine are operating as licensed wineries and shipping wines to all parts of the United States.

Amazon

In 2012, Amazon launched an online wine store; Amazon Wine. But the marketplace was shut down in 2017. Now Amazon focuses on other outlets for their alcohol sales. In 2017, online alcohol sales by Amazon in the UK and Germany grew by 96% and 230% respectively. Today, Amazon is offering 2-hour alcohol delivery in more than 10 cities in the United States through its Prime Now Service.