Making a sparkling wine with wild blueberries is accomplished in six steps: primary fermentation, clarification, tirage bottling, disgorging, closing, and labeling. Large scale production requires automation but making a few thousand bottles is possible with very little specialized equipment: a pump, press, gravity filler, crown capper, and a disgorging key. Total equipment costs should fall between $5,000 and $15,000 for a minimal set-up.
Why make a sparkling wine? Wild blueberries, with their moderate sugar (~12 Brix), good natural acidity, and soft tannin, make a base wine that is more like a sparkling wine than a still red wine, despite the color. Sparkling wine, using only the single ingredient of wild blueberries, naturally aligns with the composition of the berry.
Federal
IRS – Employer Identification Number
TTB – Basic Permit
TTB – Bonded Winery Registration
TTB – Certificate of Label Approval
FDA – Food Facility Registration
State
Department of the Secretary of State – Entity Incorporation
Department of Agriculture – Food and Fuel License
Bureau of Alcoholic Beverages – Small Winery Liquor License
Bureau of Alcoholic Beverages – Label Registration
Bureau of Alcoholic Beverages – Excise Tax
Department of Environmental Protection – Beverage container registration
Maine Revenue Service – Sales Tax Registration
Department of Labor – Unemployment Insurance and Income Tax Withholding
Local (requirements vary by locality)
Waste water processing
Certificate of Operation
Business License
Licensing a winery in Maine requires several months of planning. The Department of Agriculture Food and Fuel License requires an inspection with rigorous attention to food-borne pathogen sanitation standard
The antimicrobial properties of the lowbush blueberry (Vaccinium angustifolium) fractional components against foodborne pathogens and the conservation of probiotic Lactobacillus rhamnosus PDF
Chemical composition of lowbush blueberry cultivars PDF
USDA 2017 Maine Wild Blueberry Crop Statistics PDF
Surficial Geology Map of Maine PDF
Liqueur de Tirage PDF
Diversity and adaptive evolution of Saccharomyces wine yeast: a review PDF
Analysis of Anthocyanin Variation in Wild Populations of Bilberry ( Vaccinium myrtillus L.) in Finland link
Maine Agricultural and Forest Experiment Station Bulltein 852: Organic Wild Blueberry Production | Wild Blueberry Ecology PDF
TTB COLA Wine Label Requirements link
Genetic Diversity of Lowbush Blueberry throughout the United States PDF
Recent Advances in the Biology and Genetics of Lowbush Blueberry PDF
Molecular Mechanism and Health Role of Functional Ingredients in Blueberry for Chronic Disease in Human Beings PDF
Physical and Chemical Changes Associated with the Development of the Lowbush Blueberry Fruit Vaccinium angustifolium Ait. PDF
