A warehouse,
a short list,
and a telephone.
Top Shelf Wines and Spirits is an independent distributor. We are not a marketplace and we are not a chain — we are a room full of bottles we chose on purpose.
Started because
the good stuff
was hard to get
Top Shelf began the way most of these things begin: a handful of people who kept being told that the bottle they wanted was allocated, regional, or simply not worth a distributor’s time to ship.
So we built the distributor we wanted to buy from. Small, opinionated, quick on the phone, and willing to send one carefully packed case across the country rather than insisting on a pallet.
Four standing rules
Taste before listing
If nobody here has tasted it, it does not go on the site. There is no drop-shipped long tail hiding behind the catalogue.
Honest stock counts
If a bottle is listed, it is on the shelf today. We would rather show a short catalogue than take money for something we have to chase.
Pack like it matters
Moulded fibre inserts, double-walled cases, temperature holds in summer. Breakage is our problem, never yours.
Confirm in person
No card form, no silent charge. Every order is confirmed by a person before payment is arranged.
Brooklyn,
temperature held,
always moving
Our stock sits in a climate-controlled room in Brooklyn, held between 12 and 15 degrees with the humidity watched. Wine lies down. Spirits stand up. Everything is logged on the way in and checked again on the way out.
Orders placed before noon Eastern are picked the same day. Most of the country sees a box within three to five working days.
“We would rather carry forty bottlesTop Shelf — house rule no. 2
we believe in than four hundred we don’t.”