Wineries Shouldn’t Have to Spend So Much Time and Effort on Taxes and Compliance

Wine is a complex industry, especially regarding taxes and compliance. With regulations constantly shifting and states adding new fees affecting winemakers, things can get overwhelming quickly. When you’re keeping track of inventory with spreadsheets or basic accounting software, it can feel like you’re on your own.  

But with a wine-specific ERP solution, you can use automation to ease a lot of the burden. VinPoint Wine Management makes managing your tax tasks more efficient by automatically and accurately collecting the Tax and Trade Bureau’s (TTB) required data points.  

Tax Compliance Can Be a Heavy Lift for Wineries 

Wineries in the U.S. must file excise tax returns (Form 5000.24) and wine operations reports (Form 5120.17) with the TTB regularly. Some wineries have to file those returns and reports quarterly, semi-monthly or even monthly. That means a lot of extra paperwork on top of a winery’s actual business operations. 

For a winery to file those returns or reports on a less-intrusive annual basis, they need to meet certain criteria regarding tax liability (less than $1,000 annually) and the amount of wine on premises (less than 20,000 gallons).  

No matter how often they file, wineries have a lot to keep track of. For the TTB operations reports, wineries must perform a physical inventory count at least once a year, and they also need to document more granular details like tax classes for blended wines and transfers between different bonds. They need to provide this information in the exact format the government entity requires.  

Of course, the TTB isn’t the only entity wineries have to deal with. They need to account for any additives they use and their quantities to comply with FDA regulations.  

Then there are state-specific fees, such as the recent retail delivery fees in Colorado and Minnesota and the updated bottle bill in California, which now requires wineries to comply with the state’s container recycling program. If a winery sells its products in one of those states or a state with other fees, that’s just another item on an increasingly long list.  

VinPoint saves time on tax-related tasks 

It’s extremely important to stay accurate and compliant, but that doesn’t mean it needs to be as burdensome as it has been for you. Some of that burden is unavoidable, of course — physical inventories and detailed production histories will always take time. One area where you can save time and effort is capturing data and maintaining your records. 

VinPoint software automatically tracks the movement of every bottle of wine you sell by both the location type and excise tax class, such as wine type and alcohol percent. This means that instead of having to go back into your spreadsheets or your accounting software to recreate those different tax categories, you can simply print the report and transfer it directly to the relevant government website. The time you save on these processes can then be used on growth-oriented business functions and, well, making more wine.  

To learn more about what VinPoint can do for your winery, contact our expert team today.