The Real Cost Behind $1 or ‘FREE’ Freight Deals

The Real Cost Behind $1 or ‘FREE’ Freight Deals

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Why don't you offer $1 or Free Freight? We get asked this question a lot - especially when other retailers advertise these offers frequently on wine. So here’s the honest answer.

There’s NO Such Thing as Free Freight!

Courier Delivery costs real money and even more so when you’re shipping alcohol. Because wine is an 18+ product, couriers charge additional premiums to ensure legal compliance in New Zealand. That includes age verification, Authority to Leave requirements, and stricter delivery controls. After 29 years in the industry, this remains one of the biggest challenges in alcohol delivery and something we deal with every day at Fine Wine Delivery.

We Subsidise Freight - But We Don’t Hide It

At Fine Wine Delivery we already subsidise our courier rates and take a loss on freight every year. Delivery isn’t a profit centre for us. What we don’t do is hide those costs in the price of the wine.

Many of our competitors “$1 - $2 freight” offers, simply add $1 per bottle to the wine price. On a 12-bottle case, that’s still $12 of shipping - it’s just built into the wine instead of being shown clearly.

We prefer to keep things transparent:

  • Our wine prices stay as sharp as possible
  • Courier Costs are shown separately
  • You know exactly what you’re paying for!

Why We Use NZ Post

No courier company is perfect (we’re all human!) but NZ Post are one of the few courier partners who:

  • Correctly comply with 18+ alcohol delivery rules
  • Offer Authority to Leave where permitted (simply by the click of a link!)
  • Deliver with lower damage rates than alternatives we’ve used

When it comes to alcohol delivery, doing it properly matters more than doing it cheaply.

We don’t offer $1 or “Free” freight at Fine Wine Delivery because it’s rarely truly free. In most cases, the cost is simply hidden in higher wine prices. Instead, we choose to price our wines as sharply as possible and show courier costs separately, so you know exactly what you’re paying for.

That transparency, combined with safe, compliant delivery, is what we believe is the fairest way to do business.