Beverage ecommerce in 2026: How to sell drinks online

Beverage ecommerce: Selling non-alcoholic drinks online

Have you ever left a can of soda in your car on a hot or cold day? It’s a recipe for disaster. And a sticky car. Beverage ecommerce, i.e. the buying and selling of non-alcoholic drinks online,  might sound refreshing, but the space isn’t without its challenges.

Like any perishable good, selling and shipping beverages online requires a calculated approach and a well-oiled machine. On top of this, you have FDA hurdles to clear, tight margins, and the constant temptation to crack open a cold one.

But, beverage ecommerce is also a booming market, with the potential to hit $1.69T by 2031. It’s also an industry with tons of opportunity, from going the wholesale B2B route, to taking a direct-to-consumer (DTC) approach.

Read on to learn about the various approaches to beverage ecommerce, what the market outlook is, challenges, and how you can start selling in this fizzy market.

Selling wine, beer or spirits? Be sure to check out our wine ecommerce and alcohol ecommerce guides.

What is beverage ecommerce?

Beverage ecommerce is the practise of selling drinks, including packaged, ready-to-drink, or brew-at-home drinks through digital sales channels.

Beverage ecommerce spans a brand's own direct-to-consumer (DTC) storefront, online marketplaces like Amazon and Walmart, recurring subscriptions, and B2B or wholesale ordering portals.

While you can focus on a single channel, most successful beverage brands run at least several of the following channels:

• DTC storefront: Your own site, your margins, your customer data. The foundation for brand storytelling and subscriptions.

• Marketplaces: Amazon, Walmart, and niche marketplaces that offer built-in demand and fast discovery, at the cost of fees and less customer ownership.

• Subscriptions: Recurring delivery matched to consumption. A natural fit for both food and beverage brands, as they’re consumable and repeat buys are more likely.

• B2B/wholesale portals: Online ordering for cafés, offices, gyms, and retailers. This is often the fastest path to high-volume sales.

If you’re just breaking into beverage ecommerce, focusing on a single channel or model is ideal. Once you’ve reached some level of sustainability, then consider branching into additional channels or markets, albeit, slowly.

Beverage ecommerce vs. CPG ecommerce.

It’s easy to fold beverage commerce into consumer packaged goods (CPG) ecommerce, but the two differ in scope: beverage ecommerce is a sub-vertical of CPG ecommerce, with unique economics.

Many items that fall in CPG ecommerce can be dry goods or lower in weight, making shipping and logistics more complex for beverages. Beverages can also have a shorter shelf life than certain CPG products, meaning freshness is a higher priority.

If you plan on selling beverages alongside other consumable goods, be sure to read our online grocery ecommerce guide to fully master food & beverage ecommerce.

The beverage ecommerce market in 2026

The non-alcoholic beverage market is alive and well, showing ongoing growth. Not only is it a fast-moving ecommerce category, but it’s also one that’s prone to repeat buying. (People don’t just drink something once and never again.)

Now, just how big is this market, and where’s it going?

How big is the non-alcoholic beverage market?

The non-alcoholic beverage market is in the midst of a borderline renaissance, largely due to more and more Americans cutting back on alcohol consumption. Not only are many reducing alcohol intake, many are turning to functional beverages — non-alcoholic drinks that promote health benefits — as an alternative.

All of this results in a non-acloholic cocktail that’s closer to bursting than that soda you left in the car. And, it’s currently valued at an estimated $1.4T in 2026.

How fast is online beverage buying growing?

Okay, so the beverage commerce market is worth a lot. But, that doesn’t mean much if it took forever to get there, and if it shows no signs of going up.

Prepare for a spit take, as online beverage growth is:

• Showing a CAGR of 8%

• Benefitting from functional beverages, leading the charge at 9.2% CAGR

• Rising with a little help from one of the highest ecommerce conversion rates at 2.6%

A giant market valuation is one thing, but the sustainability of the online beverage market points toward an industry that’s not fizzling out anytime soon.

Types of non-alcoholic beverages to sell online

The menu of non-alcoholic beverages you can sell online is as diverse, if not more, than its alcoholic counterpart.

While you can carve out your own niche and focus on selling only a single type of beverage, consider the following types first, as each kind of drink can appeal to a different market.

Coffee.

Coffee, a timeless commodity that’s beloved by many. (And fuelled the better part of this article.) With a global market valuation of $249.3B in 2025, coffee is a bean worth grinding.

Not only is online coffee a lucrative brew with a high average order value (AOV), it’s versatile, sold across numerous business models:

• Roast-to-order: Roast after the order comes in for maximum freshness and premium pricing. Not as suitable for high-volume sales, but will appeal to coffee enthusiasts and typically fetch a higher price per-pound.

• Private label: A roaster produces under your brand. Faster to launch than roast-to-order, but with thinner margins.

• Dropship: Lowest startup cost, but the freshness and margin trade-offs can make it less profitable in the long run.

• Subscription: The dominant retention model in online coffee sales. Beans are purchased and renewed on a cadence matched to how fast customers brew.

One thing to always keep in mind when selling coffee: Roasted coffee is all about freshness. Days matter, so fulfilment speed is part of the product itself.

Tea.

Tea, coffee’s leafy nemesis, is another great candidate for online beverage sales. With a 2025 market size of $69.5B, tea isn’t as large as coffee, but still a big market worth considering.

Tea also has a few unique strengths that make it suited for online sales:

• The shelf life of tea is often longer than coffee, making shipping times less critical

• Tea is lightweight and purchased in smaller amounts than coffee, lowering shipping costs

• Tea is often more expensive per-ounce than coffee, which can result in stronger margins

Where business models are concerned, tea is similar to coffee: You can sell bulk, partner with a local farm and offer exclusive tea, or curate multi-origin sampler sets. And, you can offer a subscription model.

Soda and craft soft drinks.

The online soda and soft drink market is a classic, containing everything from major brand sodas to small batch craft drinks. Much like coffee, this allows this category to cater to both casual consumers and those looking for something more unique. And, with a 2025 market value of $655M, it’s giant.

(Note: The market valuation includes some functional beverages.)

As much as the soda and soft drink space is bubbling, it’s not without unique quirks:

• Canned drinks are heavier and more prone to damage than tea or coffee

• Both 12- and 24-packs of soda are heavy and large, making dimensional-weight shipping pricing high

It’s also worth noting, the market is crowded, making it difficult to break in. If you plan on selling in this space, you’ll want to differentiate where you can, or consider offering unique, regional sodas that limit your competition to the immediate area.

Functional beverages.

Functional beverages are a rising star in the drink space, marketed for health or performance benefits. With a 2025 market size of $164.7B, these drinks aren’t the only thing that’s healthy.

There are numerous types of functional beverages, making this space as versatile as it is valuable:

• Gut health and digestive tonics: Kombucha, water kefir, prebiotic sodas, ACV drinks

• Nootropic and cognitive boosters: Mushroom coffee with Lion's Mane, L-theanine teas, and more

• Adaptogenic and calming drinks: Ashwagandha botanicals, magnesium sparkling waters, holy basil, kava/CBD elixirs

• Clean energy and performance: Matcha, yerba mate, guayusa, and plant-caffeine drinks with B-vitamins/BCAAs

• Hydration and electrolyte beverages: Electrolyte waters, coconut water blends, isotonics

• Immunity and wellness shots: Ginger, turmeric, elderberry, vitamin C, zinc, and other vitamin-based drinks

• Beauty and longevity elixirs: Liquid collagen, hyaluronic waters, and antioxidant brews

• Sleep and nighttime beverages: Tart cherry, valerian, chamomile-magnesium blends, and more

Before leaping into this thriving space, be mindful of the shelf life. Many of the above drinks contain fresh ingredients and probiotics, all of which have a very limited shelf life and require refrigeration during shipping.

Bottled water and fruit and vegetable juice.

Bottled water and juices aren’t new, but they’re also two markets worth considering. The bottled water market is valued at $451.5B in 2025, and the juice market at $295.5B, making them attractive on their own or combined.

While fruit and vegetable juices can require refrigeration in some cases, and their shelf life can vary, they’re typically more forgiving than many drinks in the functional beverage category.

Water sits at the other end, with a lengthy shelf life and plenty of wiggle room on the logistics side.

Challenges of selling beverages online

The beverage market is rife with potential, but it’s not without challenges. Depending on the type of drinks you plan on selling, there are five challenges you’re likely to encounter when selling beverages online.

Heavy and fragile with costly shipping.

Shipping is the single biggest cost problem in beverage ecommerce. Liquid is heavy, glass breaks, and dimensional-weight pricing punishes multi-packs.

Further complicating matters, packaging choices change the unit economics directly:

• Cans vs. glass: Cans are lighter, tougher, and cheaper to protect.

• Concentrate vs. ready-to-drink: Shipping a 4-oz concentrate instead of 12 finished cans can improve margins and reduce the chances of damaged product.

• Pack size: Bigger orders spread fixed shipping cost — a reason to design bundles and minimums deliberately.

If a vendor offers the same product in various container types, the above can help you make the best choice. But, many products will only come in a can or glass and so on, so keep that in mind when thinking about shipping.

For more information on carrier selection and rate strategy, read our shipping and fulfilment guide.

Perishability, freshness, and cold chain dependency.

Freshness is a product feature, not just a logistics detail. Roasted coffee degrades within weeks of roasting, and live-culture products like kombucha and water kefir need temperature control from warehouse to doorstep.

Because freshness is a must, many online beverage sellers have to rely on a cold-chain fulfilment company to ensure products stay cool. But, this adds a sizable cost, reducing margins further.

Labelling and compliance.

Beverages sold online still have to meet FDA labelling rules: ingredient statements, nutrition facts, and allergen declarations.

Functional beverages carry extra weight, as many make claims like “support immunity” or “promotes sleep” and so on. Requirements around sales and messaging vary by product and state, so treat this as general guidance and confirm specifics with a qualified advisor before printing labels or trying to sell certain products in any state.

Thin margins and price competition.

Beverage margins are thin by CPG standards, and online they get squeezed from both sides: fulfilment costs on one end, marketplace fees and price-comparison pressure on the other. Winning brands protect margin with premium positioning, bundles that raise average order value, and owned channels that avoid platform fees.

Retention in a repeat-purchase category.

Retention is the flip side of the category's biggest advantage. Drinks are consumable and repurchased by nature. But, brands that fail to convert first orders into replenishment lose the very economics that make beverages attractive.

Subscription mechanics are the fix. (Covered in the marketing section below and in our ecommerce subscriptions guide.)

How to start a beverage ecommerce business

Now that you know more about drinks than you likely ever wanted, it’s time to think about launching your beverage ecommerce business.

Launching comes down to six steps:

Choose your business model and beverage niche.

Start by choosing a business model. Are you going to focus on B2B and build partner relationships? Go the DTC route? A hybrid?

Once you’ve decided on a business model, you’ll want to consider which beverage niche or drinks you want to carry. Keep in mind your business model can influence this.

For example, if you’re going B2B, sourcing fresh-roasted coffee will be more difficult than ground.

You’ll also want to determine if you want to get into beverage manufacturing, be a reseller, or partner with brands to develop your own private label beverages.

Sort licensing, labelling and compliance.

Register your business and check food-licensing rules in your state.

Most states will require a license to sell coffee and tea, from a business license to a food-handling license in some instances. This can all depend not only on the states you’re selling in, but also on any co-packer or resale arrangements, as they could take on some of the burden.

Source your product: roast, blend, co-pack, or dropship.

Success in this space requires extensive relationship building. (Unless you’ve got a giant coffee farm and an army of roasters in your pocket.)

You’ll need to lock in suppliers in advance of your store’s launch, ensuring you have time to secure any products. For coffee businesses, this means choosing between roasting in-house, partnering with a roaster, or selling the mass-produced stuff.

For tea distributors, you’ll want to consider if you’re sourcing from a tea grower or going the wholesale route. If you want to go the fresh route with tea or coffee, keep in mind timelines can shift depending on growing season.

Build your online store.

As you’re securing partners, you’ll also want to build your store. There are a few things to keep in mind:

• High-quality photography on product pages goes a long way with consumables.

• Well-written product descriptions that drive home tasting notes and flavours are a must.

• The ability for people to leave reviews and drive social proof will help long-term sales.

• For DTC businesses selling coffee or tea, content that provides brewing guidance is a big plus.

If you plan on going the DTC route, be sure to read up on DTC best practises.

Set up shipping and fulfilment.

Price fully loaded shipping per SKU — product, protective packaging, dimensional-weight cost and a damage allowance — before you set retail prices. Choose carriers and packaging tested for liquid weight, and see our shipping and fulfilment article for setup specifics.

Launch, then layer on subscriptions.

If you’re selling to consumers, go live with a subscribe-and-save offer from day one rather than bolting it on later — replenishment is the category's core economic engine. (See our ecommerce subscriptions guide for more on that.)

As volume grows, add wholesale ecommerce as a B2B growth channel for cafés, offices, and retailers.

How to choose the best ecommerce platform for a beverage company

There are countless ecommerce platforms to choose from, many of which will suit beverage ecommerce just fine. But, you don’t want fine. You want, “that platform is a tall glass of water on a hot day.”

Because beverage brands live or die on their ability to replenish in a timely manner, you need an ecommerce platform that accommodates this.

Must-have platform features for beverage brands.

As you vet potential platforms, run through this checklist to ensure you pick one with the right features:

• Native subscription and replenishment support: recurring orders without fragile third-party workarounds.

• Shipping rules built for heavy, liquid, multi-pack products: weight-based rates, carrier logic and packaging rules.

• B2B/wholesale price lists and customer groups: so cafés and retailers can order online at negotiated terms.

• Multi-storefront capability: run sub-brands or regional stores from one back end.

• Marketplace and social feeds: Amazon, Walmart and TikTok Shop syndication managed centrally.

• No transaction fees: percentage fees eat thin beverage margins on every single order.

• Extensive API support: enables easy POS integration, inventory, shipping, ERP, and more.

Many platforms will offer some of the above, but not all. Making the right platform choice early on is essential, as the wrong platform will hold you back. And, unnecessary replatforming down the road is no fun.

For example, BigCommerce offers: native B2B functionality, multi-storefront support, Feedonomics-powered channel feeds, and zero transaction fees. A combination that makes it a top ecommerce solution for beverage companies selling DTC and wholesale, all from one platform.

Explore the BigCommerce Food & Beverage solution for specifics.

Questions to ask before you commit.

Once you’ve identified a few potential ecommerce platforms, there are a few questions to ask. Take note of each provider’s answers for each, and then compare.

• What is total cost at 1,000 orders/month: platform, apps, payments and any transaction fees combined?

• Are subscriptions native, or an app whose pricing scales against you?

• Does your platform integrate with cold-chain 3PLs and beverage-friendly carriers?

• Can your platform run a wholesale portal alongside the DTC store?

Answer these four and the search for the best ecommerce solution for a beverage company usually resolves itself: the top ecommerce platform for a beverage company is simply the one that clears every question without workarounds.

Beverage ecommerce marketing and retention strategies

Because beverages are a consumable, repeat-purchase category, you’re not angling for the biggest order value possible: you’re trying to build repeat customers.

The following strategies will help you drive repeat business, while also maximising your brand’s exposure.

Subscriptions and replenishment.

First and foremost, you need to encourage repeat buying. For DTC models, this is fairly straightforward:

• Offer subscribe-and-save at a meaningful discount, positioned as the default buying option.

• Match cadence to consumption: weekly for daily coffee drinkers, monthly for wellness shots.

• Make pause, skip and swap effortless: rigid subscriptions churn, flexible ones compound.

Note: If you’re selling wholesale or B2B, you won’t offer the same kind of straightforward subscription discount. Instead, you’ll want to provide a tiered, bulk-order discount that reduces overall cost as total order volume goes up.

Email, SMS, and loyalty.

As part of your push to drive repeat orders, email and SMS reminds are huge. On top of this, loyalty programmes will further incentivise DTC customers to come back.

• Send timed replenishment reminders that map to run-out dates, not arbitrary calendars.

• Use SMS for restock and drop alerts on limited flavours.

• Reward referrals and reviews: advocacy is a cheap acquisition channel in a taste-driven category like beverages.

Beyond the above, you should also push for further social proof, both on your site and across social media channels. Be sure to read up on social proof in ecommerce, if you haven’t already.

Content, community, and UGC.

If you’re in the DTC space, fostering a community can go a long way. To make this happen, include:

• Tasty content: recipe content, brewing guides, and customer video pull more weight than spec sheets for beverage enthusiasts.

• Founder and sourcing stories: provenance is a purchase driver in coffee and tea, and further establishes your brand knows its stuff.

• Samples: De-risk first purchase with sampler packs and starter bundles.

Whether you’re in B2B or DTC, you should also make sure you have a social media presence that’s alive with fun beverage ideas. This will incentivise DTC shoppers to try your products, and make your brand more appealing to retailers looking to buy from you.

Marketplaces and retail media.

In a perfect world all your sales would come from your site, giving you complete brand control and bigger margins. But, this isn’t often the case.

Instead of viewing marketplace channels like Amazon and Walmart as competitors in the DTC space, view them as discovery and replenishment tools. Take advantage of the large platforms they provide and use them to get your brand out there.

In order to maximise your presence on other channels and marketplaces, be sure you’re practising proper product feed management, too.

The final word

The online non-alcoholic beverage market is in its heyday. But, this doesn’t guarantee success.

The brands that find true, long-lasting success in this realm are those that go beyond being a mere provider, and instead own relationships while driving replenishment.

Success won’t happen overnight, but you can start your brand on its way by:

• Picking one sub-vertical from the types section above and validating demand with a small launch range.

• Mapping compliance requirements and fully loaded shipping costs across SKUs before you build the store.

• Launching with a subscription offer and loyalty service from day one instead of bolting it on later.

Once you’ve got your store in motion, begin the process of ecommerce marketing and don’t let up. Success takes time, but with persistent effort and a strategic approach, you can have people reaching for your drinks time and time again.

FAQs about beverage ecommerce