Mail-Order Merlot? Kroger Introduces Wine Home-Delivery Business

(Bloomberg) -- Kroger Co. is getting into the wine delivery business.

The nation’s biggest supermarket company has partnered with Drinks Holdings Inc. to offer home or office delivery to customers in 14 states, with additional locations to be added in coming months. The wines -- from regions including California, Italy, France and Spain -- cost between $10.83 and $16.67 a bottle and come in six- and 12-bottle assortments.

Retailers are ramping up their wine and spirits offerings to generate additional sales as customers, particularly millennials, seek more affordable liquor options beyond beer.

Kroger’s move follows forays into wine by rivals like Target Corp., which has found success with a $5 store-brand wine label called California Roots, and Walmart Inc., which introduced a range of its own wines earlier this year for about $11 a bottle. Upscale supermarket chain Trader Joe’s started the trend more than a decade ago with its Charles Shaw label, nicknamed “Two-Buck Chuck” for its affordability. Kroger won’t sell the wine under its own label.

To contact the reporter on this story: Matthew Boyle in New York at mboyle20@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Crayton Harrison at tharrison5@bloomberg.net, Anne Riley Moffat

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