Largest Wine Retailers

America's largest wine retailers are a couple of warehouse-type stores. Total Wines passed up Costco for the number one spot in 2024. The difference between the two is Total Wines specializes in wine, and it's right there in the name. Costco is a membership "club" that sells everything. 

Buying at a big box store can be challenging. Some have their own labels, like Costco's Kirkland Signature. Trader Joe's has many private labels, meaning they contract with producers to make wine for them, starting with the (in)famous Charles Shaw, aka Two Buck Chuck. With these labels you can never be sure what you are getting.

Major retailers are often supplied by the largest wine companies because it's easier for them. These are people like Gallo, Constellation Brands, and Treasury Wine Estates. Big box stores mean you often miss out on the thousands of small, independent producers.

 

The leaders in U.S. wine sales 

Total Wine & More started with the purchase of a D.C. area chain, Total Beverages in 1998. Now they have 250 stores in 30 states with revenue of $6 billion. Fun fact: Total Wine has a sale tactic of having a lost leader wine to get people in the store. The wine might even be priced below their cost, which is illegal in some states. So they've had a bit of legal trouble.

Costco, the wildly successful membership warehouse, has its roots as the first Price Club in San Diego in 1976 followed by the first Costco in Seattle in 1983. Costco has 900 stores worldwide, about 630 in the U.S., and 114 in Canada.

 

Grocery store chains

Trader Joe's has over 600 stores starting in Pasadena, CA then expanding to 43 states and D.C. Their first stores were in California, Florida, and Arizona. Now there are about 260 stores in 28 states. 

Publix is an employee-owned chain with 1,460 stores in eight Southeastern states. Florida has 900 of the stores where it was founded in 1930.

Aldi is an international discount grocery chain headquartered in Germany. They own Trader Joe's though it is operated seperately.  They have 2,600 stores in the U.S., mostly in the eastern half of the country and California.

Lidl is another German discount grocery with 185 stores along the East Coast, concentrated in Virginia. 

Online 

Total Wine is #1

wine.com is #2.

Childhood friends and founders
 of K&L Wine Merchants

 

Independents 

The best-known independent retailer is family-owned K&L Wine Merchants, online and with retail stores in the SF Bay Area, where they started in the 1970s, and in the L.A. area.