Amazon.com: Earth's Biggest Hangover

“Earth’s Biggest Bookstore” in the late 1990s, Amazon is today Earth’s Biggest Magazine, Music, Video, Electronics, Apparel and Accessories Store. And soon it may well be earth’s biggest wine store, as well. Now that winery-to-consumer shipping is legal in 45 states, Amazon is getting into the wine business.

Unfazed by a market littered with the shattered remains of previous online wine retailers, Amazon (AMZN) is expected to begin selling by early October. Which is great news for direct-to-consumer wine sellers, who are certain to benefit from Amazon’s support. “Amazon isn’t the first company to sell wine over the Internet, but they have a lot of pull in the online market as the world’s largest online retailer,” Terry Hall of The Napa Valley Vintners Association told the E-Commerce Times. “That’s the exciting part. Consumers will get access to all those wines. It gives consumers a greater choice in what they can purchase, and gives wineries another venue to get their products out to consumers.”