How To Get Naked Wines Shipped To Canada

Founded by Rowan Gormley in 2008, Naked Wines is shaking up the wine industry in a serious way. As a distribution platform for small and boutique winemakers, Naked Wines gives curious wine-lovers the chance to try hundreds of unique bottles at very favourable prices.

Naked Wine customers (which they call Angels) fund these independent winemakers in return for exclusive access to delicious wines at wholesale prices. The winemakers win because they have the freedom to make wine the way they want to, and the consumers win by getting a larger variety at a better price.

Does Naked Wines Ship to Canada?

No, Naked Wines does not ship to Canada, but I’ve designed a process for getting any Naked Wines order shipped to Canada with the fewest headaches possible. Here’s that process, explained step-by-step.

How To Get Naked Wines Orders Shipped To Canada

Since Naked Wines doesn’t ship to Canada directly, you need to use a package forwarder: a warehouse in the United States that will accept your Naked Wines package and forward it on to you in Canada. Here’s how to make it work.

Step 1: Choose A Package Forwarder

Choosing the right package forwarder is a big deal, because that decision will determine how quickly you get your wine, and how much you have to pay for the service. I spent many hours doing some deep research on different virtual mailboxes, scoring each of them on a wide variety of relevant metrics. Here are five of the main metrics I looked at:

• Service Fees: How much do they charge to provide their core service of accepting and shipping packages, plus ancillary services such as long-term storage, re-packing, package consolidation, and more.
• Monthly/Annual Fees: How much do they charge in monthly or annual fees, if at all.
• Pricing Transparency: How much do I know about their pricing structure before sending any wine to their warehouse.
• Speed: How quickly will they process my package.
• Customer Service: How satisfied are other users with their service, and how thoroughly/quickly do they respond to my questions.

After reviewing the data I collected on these and other metrics, it became clear to me that Planet Express was the best choice. Their customer service team responded to my emails quickly and thoroughly, they have thousands of 5-star reviews online, and their fees were consistently lower than all of the other package forwarders I looked at.

Here are a few other things I like about Planet Express:

• Planet Express has a tax-free warehouse in Oregon, so you can avoid paying sales tax on your orders.
• Planet Express will consolidate multiple packages into a single box, saving you a significant amount on shipping when you make multiple purchases.
• Planet Express sends you free photos of your package as soon as it arrives at their warehouse.
• Planet Express offers extremely cheap storage for your packages. Every package receives 10 days of free storage, but after that, Planet Express only charges one cent per pound per day. That means storing a bottle of wine in their warehouse for a month would only cost you $0.60!

Step 2: Ship Your Naked Wines Order To Planet Express 

As soon as you’ve signed up for Planet Express, you’ll receive a unique mailing address at their warehouse. Once you choose the wines you want, just enter your Planet Express mailing address instead of your home mailing address and you’re all set.

Step 3: Forward Your Package

As soon as your Naked Wines order arrives at Planet Express’ warehouse, they’ll send you photos of the package to let you know it’s arrived. You’ll also be given a series of shipping options to choose from. I find that there’s generally at least 4 shipping options corresponding to 4 different price-speed combinations. Sometimes there can be as many as 10 or more shipping options—it just depends on the weight and size of your package.

My Personal Experience Shipping Naked Wines Wine To Canada

I recently used Planet Express to ship a Naked Wines order to Canada, and the experience was surprisingly smooth. Here’s how things went for me.

First, I found the wine I wanted on US.NakedWines.com. I went with the Pedro Ximenez Vina 98 Sherry.

Second, I ordered the wine to my unique address at the tax-free Planet Express warehouse in Oregon. A few days after Naked Wines shipped it out, I received an email from Planet Express letting me know that it had arrived.

Third, I filled in Planet Express’ super-easy customs declaration form with the four pieces of information required:

1. The item being shipped: “Four wine bottles”
2. The number of items: “4”
3. The value of the item: “$50”
4. Whether the item contains batteries: “No” 

Then I chose the shipping option I wanted from a list of eight. Prices ranged from $16 – $48 USD, plus insurance at an additional $5 USD, so I chose the cheapest one ($21 USD, including the insurance), and I was done. My wine was shipped out later that same day.

The Costs

In my experience, the price I paid ($16 USD + $5 USD in insurance) is pretty standard for shipping Naked Wines to Canada with Planet Express. The only thing I haven’t accounted for so far are the customs charges, which can be expensive depending on the province you live in.

Here are customs charges you’d have to pay to import my wine order ($60 CAD cost, 3 liters in total) for a few different Canadian provinces:

Things aren’t bad if you live in Alberta (alcohol import taxes are much lower there), but most of the rest of Canada has to pay a pretty penny.

In Summary

Overall, shipping Naked Wines to Canada using Planet Express is easy and smooth. The shipping costs are reasonable, but the customs charges can actually exceed the price of the wine itself. If you’re set on buying from Naked Wines (perhaps to get a bottle you can’t get locally in Canada), I highly recommend using Planet Express.