Alcoholic beverages are on the wane and the popularity of non-alcoholic wines, beers and cocktails is on a steady rise, according to those who keep tabs on that kind of thing. And the trend, though slow, seems to be holding steady…
Younger drinkers – largely those in the Gen X and Z demographics – are the largest
drivers of significant increases in demand for non-alcohol beers and wines…
Propelled by the demands of an up and coming younger audience, the popularity of non-alcoholic recreational beverages is on a steady rise. The Gen X and Z kids are more active and are reportedly getting their mind-expanding recreational experiences from other products – in Canada, where it’s now legal, largely Cannabis and approved Weed-infused edibles. The younger generations have apparently ‘got the message’ about the potential risks and dangers of alcohol before they developed a taste or habit for it.
“Ten years ago, you would go into a party with a non-alcoholic beer, and people would ask you if you were pregnant or sick,” said Nicolas Gagnon-Oosterwaal, president and co-founder of Montreal-based brewery Sober Carpenter. “But now … it’s completely the other way around.”
Potential for massive growth
And there’s still massive space for further growth in alcohol free versions of all types of currently alcohol-based drinks.
“What happened for craft beer in the last five, 10 years, I think will happen in the next five, 10 years for non-alcoholic [drinks in general],” Gagnon-Oosterwaal predicts. Already, if you’re interested and persistent enough, you can get non-alcohol variants of any kind of alcoholic drink. However, brand choices and styles in certain types of booze – cider and perry, for example – are still severely limited.
Witness, for instance, the growth in interest in non-alcohol and low-alcohol wines over the past decade or so. Anyone who’s cared to look into the market stats will confirm that there’s also been an up-surge in demand for non-alcoholic ‘mock-tails’ over just the past few years. Shirley Temple has come of age!
Not necessarily a matter of price
… But there is an enticing difference – favouring non-alcoholic bevs – between them and the real deal. Non alcoholic beers are priced between $8 and $15 per 6-pack here in Canada at most supermarkets. Compare that with prices of around $13 and up for alcoholic brews. Non-alcohol wine is averaging $15 to $20 per bottle. Regular alcohol-based wine starts at just above $20 per bottle and – as wine lovers will tell you – has no practical upper limit.There’s got to be an attraction there for folks who drink beer and wine for the refreshing taste. But the issue of cost is meaningless for those who drink for the buzz. Or to support an established addiction to alcohol.
Then there’s the hard core of aficionados who insist that non-alcohol beer can’t match the real deal for complexity and depth of flavour. I don’t know. But I can tell you my impression of the non-alcohol wines I’ve tried is that many have a metallic background taste lurking in the far corners of their flavour profiles. Not much, mind you, but enough to negatively impress anyone with sensitive taste buds.
Although… Some of us (like me) may not consider that an issue any more. We’re the folks who’ve suffered the loss of our senses of smell and taste after having COVID – and are still waiting for them to come back. I recently read about a survey that claimed loss of taste and smell due to COVID and Long COVID may take as much as a year to abate. Some folks may not get them back at all. I still have a variety of symptoms associated with Long COVID. Not the least of which is that, some days, all I can taste when drinking wine is an exasperating metallic tang.
Anyway…
For me, the most import consideration when gauging the ‘soaring’ popularity of non-alcohol beverages is scale. Sales of real-deal alcohol are still way ahead of non-alcohol drinks. Even dual-digit growth in sales of non-alcohol beverages in the past few years works out to a very small impact on traditional alcoholic bevs, in terms of actual bottles sold.
~ Maggie J.