After a series of unsuccessful attempts over the years, Amazon.com made its long-awaited move into the world of online wine sales this morning.

The company’s new Amazon Wine portal offers bottles from wineries around the country. Those wineries will ship directly to customers in twelve states at launch.

It’s an interesting move for Amazon, and a significant moment for the wine industry overall. Amazon says it will offer a wide variety of wine, from a  Francis Ford Coppola Winery 2011 Rosso & Bianco red blend Rosso for $12, to premium wines such as the Hall 2009 Kathryn Hall Cabernet Sauvignon for $110.

Shipping will be available for up to six bottles for $9.99. One complication when it comes to wine is the state-to-state regulations for selling alcohol. At launch, Amazon says shipping will be available to California, Connecticut, Florida, Idaho,Illinois, Iowa, Nebraska, Nevada, North Carolina, Oregon, Washington, Wyoming and the District of Columbia, “with more coming soon.”

The Wall Street Journal reported in September that Amazon would charge wineries a 15 percent commission on sales.

Amazon’s size can have a major impact in any market that it enters, for better and worse. The company’s separate move into digital book publishing has been praised by independent authors while causing no shortage of disruption for major book publishers.
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