Drinks, which provides ecommerce solutions for alcohol sales, has partnered with UrbanStems to integrate beverage alcohol for a single checkout experience within the floral delivery retailer’s platform. The collaboration kicks off with organic wines from the female-founded brand Avaline, and the new integration is designed to position wine as a natural extension of UrbanStems’ elevated gifting experience, available not only for special occasions but also for celebrating everyday moments.
Drinks also has kicked off a partnership with luxury brand Quince, marking the beginning of Drinks’ decentralized retail network of lifestyle brands, content creators and major e-tailers. The Drinks Access network supports a go-to-market channel for wineries to now gain access to Quince’s millions of affluent, digitally savvy customers.
The Quince wine selection, part of its newly established gourmet foods category, will be anchored by LVMH’s Dom Pérignon, with plans to expand to a tiered portfolio offering both premium and value options, modeled on similar assortments at Costco and Total Wine.
Outsourcing the Complexities of Alcohol Sales
“At UrbanStems, we’re always exploring new ways to elevate the art of gifting through thoughtful curation and beautifully designed experiences,” said Meenakshi Lala, CEO of UrbanStems in a statement. “Delivering fresh flowers nationwide next-day is already a complex operation, and incorporating wine introduces an entirely new level of sophistication and logistical challenge. By partnering with Drinks, we’re able to simplify that complexity behind the scenes and give customers a truly seamless, elevated gifting experience.”
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The Drinks Anywhere platform enables UrbanStems to offer a fully integrated wine selection without obtaining alcohol licenses, holding inventory, managing state-by-state alcohol regulations or building new operational capabilities. Orders are accepted and fulfilled by licensed alcohol producers and retailers connected to Drinks’ platform, with Drinks managing the connectivity between the regulated and unregulated ecosystems, including unique tax and compliance requirements and order routing.
In October 2023 Drinks sold the Wine Insiders brand that it had acquired in 2014 to focus on continuing to scale its alcohol ecommerce enablement technology, and in September 2024 Drinks first offered the “Drinks-as-a-Service” Anywhere platform to support online alcohol sales for other retailers.
In May 2024, UrbanStems leveraged an AI-powered chatbot to help it deal with customer service during two highly compressed peak sales periods around Valentine’s Day and Mother’s Day.
