EoB #13: Non-Alcoholic Beverages

Well, it’s that time of year again.

It’s dark all the time.

The temperature alternates maddeningly between “Global warming will kill us all” and “Global warming doesn’t sound so bad, actually.”

Incredibly specific football theme songs become the soundtrack to our lives five or six nights a week.

Logically the only way to survive is to… stop drinking for 31 days?

Dry January

If you feel like Dry January seemingly came out of nowhere and quickly cemented itself as a part of the zeitgeist, you’re correct. What started as a public health initiative in the UK in 2013 has become an increasingly popular reset at the start of each year. The opportunity to pause drinking clearly struck a collective chord, with incredible adoption over the past decade — over 20% of adults participated in 2022, primarily driven by Millennials and Gen X’ers. (If you think 20% mass-market adoption is low, obviously you’ve never been a 13 year old girl a product marketer.)

The popularity of Dry January has spawned additional booze-free months like Sober October and books about how to do a temporary dry-out. Sober “challenges” have even become a bit of a cool kid bragging right à la the old joke “How do you know if someone is a [vegan/crossfitter/barefoot runner/HBS grad]? Don’t worry, they’ll tell you.”

Part of this comes from an organic cultural movement towards talking about and accepting sobriety, both permanent and temporary, after Covid. During the early days of the pandemic, many of us (read: me) indulged in virtual happy hours and nightly cocktails to cope with what was, frankly, an incredibly stressful and traumatic time.

But as Covid lockdowns loosened and life stuttered back to some semblance of normal, many of those same folks realized that their drinking was, at the risk of co-opting therapy speak, no longer serving them. Whether they realized they didn’t have the healthiest relationship with alcohol, or just flat out didn’t like the feeling of being drunk (or worse, the following hangxiety), normies and celebs alike began exploring the world of sobriety.

NA Bevvies

Before the rising popularity of sobriety, beverage manufacturers approached non-alcoholic options with a fundamental misunderstanding of the market. There were only a handful of purpose-made NA beverages, but weren’t well positioned or marketed. O’Douls, for example, hit the market in 1990 as a “near beer” with <0.5% ABV, but pretty quickly became a punchline.

But in the last ten years there’s been a sharp increase in sober curiosity, especially due to Gen Z — less than 20% of adults between 21 and 28 consume alcohol. (Compare this with Gen X, known for their heavy, risky drinking behaviors.) Essentially, Gen Z came of age as trends like Dry January were kicking off, and now that they’re of drinking age, they drink less. As a result, adult NA drinks are now a robust marketplace less focused on catering to types of sober customers and moving closer towards sober drinking “use cases” as @shwinnabegobrand points out. (As an aside, even if you’re not in the product/marketing/advertising space, if you find this stuff interesting, he’s a 10/10 follow.)

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People choose to stop drinking or simply drink less for a wide variety of reasons. Two of the most common that I encountered when working for a wine company were pregnancy and serious illness, such as cancer. These consumers don’t necessarily want to avoid the ritual of a drink - they just can’t have the alcohol right now.

Similarly, folks may be reducing or avoiding alcohol for other temporary reasons like training for a sports event (ask me about my 3 sober months training for a marathon — I’ll never shut up!) or not wanting to be hungover the next day for work. (Is there anything worse than a Tuesday night happy hour that goes way too hard?)

Just as Ashwinn points out, many of these reasons are situational or “use case” dependent versus permanent or demographic-specific. The flood of expertly packaged, highly Instagrammable brands makes it easier than ever to have a satisfying night cap or pool-side bevvie, without the alcohol or (mostly) former stigma of sobriety.

Today I’m digging into one NA brand I think is crushing it better than a Baltimore bartender on a hot summer day, plus one brand whose new product is more questionable than a bottle of Popov run through a Brita filter 12 times.

Cann

One of the best-marketed brands in the NA space isn’t trying to mimic alcohol — in fact, their marketing team goes right for the jugular when comparing themselves with traditional boozy drinks. And that’s part of what makes them so loveable.

Cann, a collection of high-brow flavored seltzers “micro-dosed” with a few milligrams of THC, is focused on the growing California Sober trend. The premise of the majority of their marketing is how Cann gives you a delightful buzz without the hangover.

Over the past 3-4 years since their inception, Cann has adapted their product line to cover as much of the TAM (total addressable market) as possible. One of the biggest challenges with THC products is the wide variability in how much someone needs to consume to feel it, especially with new consumers who may be worried about getting too stoney-baloney and calling 911 on themselves.

As they’ve gained distribution and market share, Cann has expanded from their standard-size mini-cans to Hi-Boys (get it?) with double the THC and the brand new Lo-Boys with half their normal dose for a “more social drinking experience”. They’ve even dabbled in seasonal flavors, like pineapple jalapeno for summer and cranberry sage for winter.

To be frank, Cann’s marketing is a little all over the place. But as a brand that doesn’t take themselves too seriously, it feels exactly right. Cann is unabashedly pro-THC and anti-alcohol. (They refer to themselves as “drugs” frequently and are very explicit that they’re not a CBD-based product.) Their marketing is subversive, and it works perfectly, particularly because of the legal grey area they operate in. If Cann’s marketing efforts were a movie, they would be Saltburn: very weird and at times a bit unsettling, but very good.

As a small, independent company they take big risks (like photoshopping a Martha Stewart endorsement) and are vocal about advocating for social causes. Their branding and marketing work precisely because they’re so deeply authentic to who they are as a company. InBev is not going to post memes on Instagram about how Leonardo DiCaprio refuses to date women over the age of 25 or ragging on Lexus’s December To Remember.

TL;DR? They’re not afraid to take a risk; the people who are turned off by their marketing probably weren’t in their target demo anyway. If it’s working, why change? As a category creator with a loud, unabashed brand personality, Cann will continue to stand out from the crowd. (At least, until they’re acquired by Altria or Beam Suntory and forced to tone it down.)

White Claw

You may have missed its tepid launch, but White Claw just released a 0% non-alcoholic seltzer. And if you’re thinking “but wouldn’t that just be… seltzer water?” nope! They put sugar, electrolytes, and other weird shit proprietary ingredients in there to recreate the flavor of a true White Claw. The result? Well… they got what they were aiming for, I guess.

In short, White Claw has confused a consequence with a benefit. Regular White Claw tastes bad the way it does because it’s an alcoholic beverage aiming to keep calories low via artificial flavors and fake sweeteners. If you take out the calorie-laden alcohol, you don’t actually have to keep all the mediocre artificial flavors.

They’ve also completely misjudged their target market. In a time when NA beverages are elevating their ingredients and packaging to make sobriety feel as indulgent as a craft cocktail, White Claw asks “but what if we didn’t?” Normally I would say perhaps they’re targeting younger drinkers who still want to fit in as their peers shotgun malt liquor beverages at a tailgate… but, as discussed earlier, Gen Z is sober by majority. (And I hope to god Millennials and Gen X are past our “no laws when you’re drinking Claws” days?)

The stronger move (IMO) would have been to keep the alcohol and level up the ingredients and cans. Lose the neon colors and tacky wave that’s come to be associated with underage college kids. Move to natural flavorings and a sleeker brand look, to recapture your grown-up target demo (aka the Abercrombie playbook).

But here we are, with the NA drink the market didn’t ask for. So, whether you’re pregnant, training for a marathon, or presenting to the CEO tomorrow morning at 8am, if you still desperately want the acrid taste of a Wildwood, NJ summer without the repercussions, I guess this Bud’s 0% White Claw’s for you.

Pour Yourself A Tall Glass of Links

• Obsessed with these painfully expensive but absolutely delicious cans of bitters & soda. (If anyone can crack the case on how to DIY, please — my inbox is open!! It’s more than just bitters.)

• Sobriety’s increasing popularity is having ripple effects in other industries, like travel.

• I’ve been curious about the psychology of maintaining drinking rituals with look-and-taste-alike alcohol-free products. This piece is a fascinating look at the booming NA industry through the eyes of a journalist and former drinker.

• Very, very curious about this NA cousin to the dirty martini. Will try and report back. 🍸️ 

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