Does anybody have any recommendations for shipping in the summer? Is it risky? Is there more of a chance of bottles exploding? Is it safe to ship caged/corked sours?
Since no one else has answered your question I'll try help out a little. First of all, this topic comes up every year, especially around this time when the weather starts warming up. You might be able to find some older posts if you search hard enough. No, there is no "safe" way that I know of to ship bottles during the summer. I know Fedex delivers to my house much earlier than UPS therefore I ask people to use Fedex in the summer. If you have enough packages delivered you may be able to find you are in a similiar position. Pay attention to when and who drops off your boxes. Yes, it is somewhat risky but not as much as you may think. I live in TX and last summer was f'in horrendous (if we have another summer like that I'll move, hardly joking) and I only had one bottle explode. Unfortunately it was Brute but they are known for having higher carbonation issues. I did have other caged and cork bottles delivered with no problems. Just be careful, if a certain beer is known for being highly cabonated you may want to hold off. Also, its debatable, but throwing on a good amount tape around the cage and cork can't hurt. Another debatable topic is whether the extreme temps of sitting in a hot ass un-air conditioned truck will alter the flavor/profile of the beer. I would find it hard to believe that a beer sitting in a box, wrapped in bubble wrap, in the back of a truck when it's 110 degrees OUTSIDE wouldn't have a negative effect on the beer. Having said that, I have never noticed a difference in the flavor, carbonation, etc. Oh yeah, also try to be sure you ship and or your partner ships early enough in the week so that the beer won't be sitting in a warehouse over the weekend. So ideally Monday or Tues. Hope this kinda helped.
cfh64 covered a lot of it. It really does matter where you're shipping and what the temps will be. Sitting in a warehouse over the weekend in Texas during a heat wave is a recipe for disaster. But shipping mid-week to New England during an average 85 degree summer week is generally fine. It's not quite as problematic as the winter, but you do want to take some precautions and pay attention to the forecast.
Bottom line is that you are going to be just fine shipping in the summer if you do it right. Just be sure to ship on Mondays that way you can get the box to its destination inside the same week. You want to avoid having a box baking in a non climate controlled warehouse over a weekend. I have also been told that sometimes boxes will stay on the truck over a weekend. Just ship on Mondays during the summer and winter and everything will be ok. If you can't drop off on Mondays you can drop off on a Saturday after last pickup. That way the box sits in the climate controlled store until Monday pickup.
