Can your winery ship wine to Connecticut?

Connecticut DTC wine shipping requirementsCan a winery ship wine directly to consumers in Connecticut?Yes — Remote DTC by an out-of-state winery is expressly lawful under permit; no reciprocity gate and no production cap on the consumer channel. And it is one of four registrations: the DCP permit, a DRS sales-and-use-tax seller's permit, a DRS chapter 220 alcoholic-beverages distributor licence, and registration with the CT Secretary of the State. Volume limits apply; the exact cap is in the table below. Last verified 2026-08-01 against primary sources; next review due 2026-10-30.

DTC shipping

Generally permitted

Permit required

Yes — and it is one of four registrations: the DCP permit, a DRS sales-and-use-tax seller's permit, a DRS chapter 220 alcoholic-beverages distributor licence, and registration with the CT Secretary of the State

Licence

Out-of-State Winery Shipper's Permit for Wine (DCP short name: 'Out-of-State Winery Shipper')

Application fee

$415 in year one ($315 annual permit fee + $100 nonrefundable initial application fee); $315 per year on renewal. The $600 figure belongs to a different permit (out-of-state retailer shipper's permit for wine).

Bond required

Yes

Volume cap

5 gallons of wine per person in any two-month period. The limit is volumetric, per recipient person (not per household), and there is no annual cap and no state aggregate cap.

Sales tax

true — destination-sourced to the Connecticut delivery address, with no de minimis or economic-nexus threshold for a permitted direct shipper

State sales-tax rate

6.35%

Excise tax

Yes — the direct shipper is deemed a chapter 220 distributor and must hold a DRS distributor's licence before shipping

Excise rate

$0.79 per wine gallon — still wine not more than 21% absolute alcohol, produced by a winery that is NOT a small winery. Four other rates apply to product a CT winery-shipper permit can carry: $0.20 per wine gallon for still wine not more than 21% produced by a small winery (55,000 wine gallons or less per year, certificate required); $1.98 per wine gallon for still wine over 21% and for ALL sparkling wine; $0.26 per wine gallon for cider not more than 7% alcohol; $2.71 per wine gallon for liquor coolers not more than 7% ABV.

Shipment reports

Monthly — to the Department of Consumer Protection, submitted only through eLicense as an upload of the period's invoices ('Monthly Shipping Reports'). Required only where wine was shipped directly to individual consumers. Paper reports are refused. A separate monthly report of alcoholic beverages shipped into Connecticut (DRS Form AU-933) is due to DRS by the 10th of the following month.

Record retention

3 years — and the basis is the alcoholic beverages tax statute, not the Liquor Control Act, which imposes no retention period on a direct shipper at all

Product registration

Required — every brand must be registered with DCP before shipping, at $200 per brand for out-of-state shippers, valid three years. An annual price posting by January 6 is a second, separate obligation the guide omits entirely.

Approved carriers

Neither. Connecticut publishes no approved-carrier list. § 30-18a(b)(8) requires the shipper either to hold an in-state transporter permit itself or to ship 'through the use of a person who holds such an in-state transporter permit' issued by DCP under § 30-19f. The permit — not the carrier's brand — is what makes a delivery lawful.

Regulator

Connecticut Department of Consumer Protection, Liquor Control Division (licensing is handled by the License Services Division)

Last verified

2026-08-01

Next review due

2026-10-30

Verified 2026-08-01 by primary-source audit against 21 primary sources; next review due 2026-10-30. How we verify.

DTC wine compliance guide, all 51 jurisdictions

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