# Commercial Winery License



## Romahawk (Jul 11, 2005)

Does anyone know how difficult it is to obtain a commercial winery license and just how one would go about getting one? I have a friend who makes a pretty fair bottle of Mead and he suggested that it would be great if we teamed up and made some to sell. I know here in NY you can get a fairly cheap farm license which is supposedly not to hard to get but someone told us there is also a federal license that we would need and that it wasn't as easy to get that one. Has anyone been through the process that might be able to give us some advice and steer us in the right direction?


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## Panhandle Bee man (Oct 22, 2003)

Start at the Cooperative extension office, over by the airport. Cornell University has done some work on commericial Meaderies, and they may have some of the information on where to start, or point you in the direction you need to take.


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## Sport (Dec 11, 2006)

Talk to this guy. http://limeadery.com/pages/1/index.htm

He was telling me that the process is quite intensive. not only does every recipe has to be approved by the ATF, but the ingredients and the sources, and the lable. That one surprised me. He showed me one lable that was denied and then the one that was approved. Almost no difference, but they want what they want. They also don't know a lot about what mead is.


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## Romahawk (Jul 11, 2005)

Thanks guys for the input. I'll have to take a look at these but it sounds like my friend may want to bite off a bigger chunk than we can chew here..


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## Ben Brewcat (Oct 27, 2004)

The two guys I know that went pro 1) said it was a HUGE hassle even if it had gone smoothly and 2) that no one in regulation-land knew what mead was and they both had trouble with getting that ironed out. My hat's off to anyone who wants to make the dream come true and I don't want to dissuade anyone at all, just be forewarned that anytime the gov't hears "alcohol" and "sales" in the same sentence you're on Big Brother's tax-em and regulate-em list and your life gets a lot more complicated.


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## Aspera (Aug 1, 2005)

They are worried that the monopoly might fall into the hands of people who actually care about what they are doing. American wines COULD be the best in the world, but instead we have highly branded crap sold at double its market value. Thanks Mondovi! The FTA should've been dissolved after all the abuses of the tobacco industry became public knowledge. I'm not certain that they are doing an especially fine job of firearm regulation either.


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## Ben Brewcat (Oct 27, 2004)

Someone on BS had a sig line that said "ATF should be a convenience store, not a government agency" that gave me many a chuckle.


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## Joel (Mar 3, 2005)

Romahawk, I completely disagree. Don't let a dream get shot down by a little government red tape. Our Fingerlakes region is packed with wineries being run by people no smarter than you and only slightly smarter than me.

Keep in mind the Government works for you, these guys are human and in most cases if you have the right attitude things will go suprisingly easy for you.

Grab for the brass ring, make great mead and sell a ton of it. When you get your license, and set up going pop on my web site, E-mail me and I'll fill you in on how to sell every bottle you can make if it's good stuff!


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## livetrappingbymatt (Jan 13, 2006)

*mead*

talk to george martin. he lives in oswego area but has a wine store on the wine trail in waterloo,ny.
makes a mead that my wife likes also a rassberry melomin,hope i spelled that right?
bob


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## nursebee (Sep 29, 2003)

NPR quote 5/14: We figured out how to make a small fortune with a winery. Start with a large fortune.

I'd consider first having an established fermentation business contract the work to start. It would eliminate the hastle of all the licenses and equipment. You'd then only need a cheapo license to distribute/sell. I've considered the same. The biggest issue a new product like this could face is NOT ENOUGH 
PRODUCT

Try this http://www.nysaes.cornell.edu/fst/faculty/henick/harvestpdfs/Winery_Licensing18SEP04.pdf

You'd also have to satisfy the federalis


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## JohnBeeMan (Feb 24, 2004)

>>>Keep in mind the Government works for you
And what planet are you from?

My son keeps talking about the idea of doing mead sales verous honey sales. But I keep drinking all the produce.


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