Brewers Add Non-Alcoholic Drinks as Polls Show Young Drinkers Have Health Concerns (cnn.com) 74
Friday America's surgeon general warned that alcohol is "a well-established, preventable cause of cancer responsible for about 100,000 cases of cancer and 20,000 cancer deaths annually in the United States," and recommended an update to the warning labels on alcohol.
So what happens to beer and spirits companies? They've actually been preparing for something like this for years, reports CNN: Major brewers, including Molson Coors and Anheuser-Busch InBev, and spirit giants such as Diageo and Pernod Ricard, have all grown their portfolios with new non-alcoholic drinks to attract an increasing number of consumers, particularly younger ones, who are ditching drinking because of health concerns. A Gallup poll from August found that almost half of Americans say that having one or two drinks a day is bad for a person's health — the highest percentage recorded in the survey's 23 years, and younger adults were most likely to say drinking is bad for health. The poll also showed that just 58% of adults said they drink alcohol, down from 67% in 2022, although Gallup notes it's relatively close to the historical average of 63% going back to 1939.
But that doesn't predict a doomsday scenario for Big Alcohol. It actually could be good for their bottom lines: A December report from IWSR, a leading drinks analysis firm, said that the non-alcoholic drinks global market is "experiencing a transformative period of growth, driven by evolving consumer behaviors and the momentum of no-alcohol." The trend, to be led by the United States, is expected to grow by $4 billion by 2028 in the firm's forecast. Non-alcoholic drinks are even "skewing younger than the core buyer demographic across markets, and demonstrate higher frequency and intensity of consumption," signaling that there's a sustained thirst for booze-less beverages.
Anheuser-Busch said in its 2023 annual report that its non-alcoholic beers "continued to outperform, delivering high-teens revenue growth."
And the staff economist for the Brewers Association told CNN that non-alcoholic beer sales have jumped more than 100% between 2021 and 2024.
So what happens to beer and spirits companies? They've actually been preparing for something like this for years, reports CNN: Major brewers, including Molson Coors and Anheuser-Busch InBev, and spirit giants such as Diageo and Pernod Ricard, have all grown their portfolios with new non-alcoholic drinks to attract an increasing number of consumers, particularly younger ones, who are ditching drinking because of health concerns. A Gallup poll from August found that almost half of Americans say that having one or two drinks a day is bad for a person's health — the highest percentage recorded in the survey's 23 years, and younger adults were most likely to say drinking is bad for health. The poll also showed that just 58% of adults said they drink alcohol, down from 67% in 2022, although Gallup notes it's relatively close to the historical average of 63% going back to 1939.
But that doesn't predict a doomsday scenario for Big Alcohol. It actually could be good for their bottom lines: A December report from IWSR, a leading drinks analysis firm, said that the non-alcoholic drinks global market is "experiencing a transformative period of growth, driven by evolving consumer behaviors and the momentum of no-alcohol." The trend, to be led by the United States, is expected to grow by $4 billion by 2028 in the firm's forecast. Non-alcoholic drinks are even "skewing younger than the core buyer demographic across markets, and demonstrate higher frequency and intensity of consumption," signaling that there's a sustained thirst for booze-less beverages.
Anheuser-Busch said in its 2023 annual report that its non-alcoholic beers "continued to outperform, delivering high-teens revenue growth."
And the staff economist for the Brewers Association told CNN that non-alcoholic beer sales have jumped more than 100% between 2021 and 2024.
Bad for your wallet (Score:2)
Booze costs a lot. Young adults have been choosing cheap, low-quality hooch for decades as a cheap way to get drunk. When even the worst junk on the market is eating into your meagre check, it's time to put down the bottle before addiction takes hold.
Unless young folks are hellbent on being stupid, they're not going to help Big Alcohol(tm) maintain their profit margins.
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I'd argue this is less about costs and more about competition. Drug variety and availability is way up. All competing for the same limited pool of money from intoxication budgets of people.
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Maybe? You'd have to show that usage and od rates are going up yearly. Maybe weed is filling the gap, but legal and cheap weed isn't necessarily that common. There are a lot of relatively novel THC products now, and they don't seem that cheap either. Certainly not compared to a $.99 40 Oz.
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In places where weed is legal...can one not grow their own pot?
That can't be terribly expensive.
I mean, hell...it isn't that expensive to brew your own beer and you can get EXCELLENT results pretty quickly these days.
I
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In places where weed is legal...can one not grow their own pot?
That can't be terribly expensive.
Even places where recreational weed is legal, I imagine you might get looks from the neighbors if you started a pot farm in your yard. If you grow it indoors you have to factor in the cost of the equipment and electricity to do so, on top of however you value the time and effort you expend. But maybe you defray those costs by selling product to your friends... aaaaaand now you're a drug dealer.
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I just go for alcohol, but only recently realized just how much my friends use harder drugs these days-- I will exclude Pot from that kind of list, but between coke, ecstasy, mushrooms, and acid it was quite a surprise. I am even throwing prescription drugs out of the equation there...
Alcohol prices have gone up, selection has gone down... and I need to lose some weight. Guess what goes away...
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" Young adults have been choosing cheap, low-quality hooch for decades as a cheap way to get drunk. "
When we were young, we ordered tonic and put our own expensive gin from home into it.
Young people are nowadays running around all day long with giant bottles, I guess they're doing it wrong.
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Borgs are mostly a reaction to people spiking drinks at parties. Even the cheap booze for mixers can be $$$ so it's gonna cost either way.
Anheuser-Busch nonalcoholic beer outperforms.... (Score:4, Interesting)
Anheuser-Busch said in its 2023 annual report that its non-alcoholic beers "continued to outperform, delivering high-teens revenue growth."
...because their regular beer sucks!!!! Also, growth can be misleading. If you go from .01 to .015%, that's 50% growth...very impressive percentage-wise, but I'd rather get the alcoholic beer revenue.
Also, non-alcoholic beer is pointless. What's the market?...those who want to get really fat really quickly and hold a beverage that looks like a beer at a party to the visually impaired so they don't stand out?
I barely drink myself. No one gives you shit for it. Show some backbone and say..."no thank you" politely and assertively and people move on...under the theory..."OK...that's odd, well, I guess more for me then" and then forget about it 2 minutes later. The same is true with drugs. I choose to abstain from both for personal reasons and no one has every complained. I've been to a lot of parties with a lot of marijuana and sometimes even cocaine (college and early 20s mostly for the hard stuff)...no one gives a shit...in fact, most like it because I can drive them home. So if you're drinking non-alcoholic beer, you're getting the weight gain purely for the flavor of beer? I actually like the taste of beer...but not enough to get fat drinking fake beer.
Unless Anheuser Busch has really improved the flavor of their non-alcoholic beers in the last 20 years since I last tried one...it was never even close to their best-tasting beer. So I doubt it "tastes good". I doesn't get you buzzed and it has severe health consequences from the obesity. So...not sure the market...but happy for them if they can make it work...not for me, confused as to who it is for...but that's OK.
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Serious question: beyond the hipster specialty beer value, are there people who actually drink beer for taste rather than alcohol content?
Because we had a fun "stated preferences vs revealed preferences" moment when law changed allowing higher alcohol content beer to hit the market. And it's quite popular. Because higher alcohol content obviously. But a lot of people say "they like the taste better".
But they could never be bothered to walk next door to the government monopoly alcohol seller chain to get the
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are there people who actually drink beer for taste rather than alcohol content?
I'm sure there are, and for all alcoholic drinks in general. Otherwise everyone would just drink Everclear.
Re:Anheuser-Busch nonalcoholic beer outperforms... (Score:4, Insightful)
Different strength beverages usually have accompanying drinking processes to reflect this. Really high proof stuff tends to get mixed or consumed in shots with a fair amount of fuss per milliliter; wines and higher strength beers are often paced by a food pairing; low ABV beers and the 'alcopop' genre of premixed stuff normally aims to be something you can drink mostly limited by your willingness to actually consume that much liquid without overshooting too much.
You obviously see deviations from this, especially with the inexperienced, the real problem drinkers, or those on very low budgets; but given how fast you can drink a painfully incapacitating amount of alcohol, were that the objective, most actual drinks are (while not necessarily something you'd bother with in non-alcoholic form) effectively preferences in how to pad out the consumption rate to better match the desired time and intensity requirements.
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I think you can counter with the absurdly huge variety and popularity in different micro/mid brew brands and styles. The place down the street from me will have no less than 20 types on tap any given night, including 3-4 of the same style (IPA, Lager). Plenty of people will choose based on things like types of hops, filtered/non-filtered, etc. The highest alcohol content aren't even the most popular. If you want to get wasted there's far more efficient ways of doing it that $15 four packs or $9 tap pours
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Wholly shit...where the fuck do you live where 4-paks of beer are $15 and a draft beer costs $9?!?!?
I've never heard of prices that high before...and I'm no stranger too drinking beers, good craft beers and hitting some brew pubs....
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I've paid $9 for a beer at a brewpub in my hometown in the Midwest US - maybe understandable given that it's billed as a premium craft product. I've also paid $8 (>$9 with tip) for a draught Bell's Two Hearted at a Buffalo Wild Wings.
You don't exactly have to be in NYC to be paying $9 for a beer anymore.
Re:Anheuser-Busch nonalcoholic beer outperforms... (Score:4, Insightful)
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I'm somewhat allergic to Brewer's Yeast but the strains used in Imperial Stout don't bother me.
They can handle higher ABV before going dormant so some proteins must be different.
They're super expensive but your typical malt liquor is cheaper per mole. The cost of bottles, bottling, and shipping are fixed.
Light Beer would be the opposite.
Everclear has a dumb premium so people buy vodka.
Personally I buy a 4-pack of stout once a year and put the flavor money budget into ribeye.
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are there people who actually drink beer for taste rather than alcohol content
Sure there are. And low alcohol beers have come a long way in taste. I used to drink them only at parties when I had to drive home afterwards, nowadays I drink them at home as well when I want a beer with my food. At parties, one advantage of beer (with or without alcohol) is that you can drink a lot of it, compared to sodas, orange juice, or other non alcoholic options typically found at parties.
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are there people who actually drink beer for taste rather than alcohol content
Sure there are. And low alcohol beers have come a long way in taste.
They most certainly have. I'm particularly fond of Athletic Brewing's products. Also I used to enjoy a Canadian beer from Partake, but sadly it's no longer available where I live in California. Partake is very low in calories and carbs, but still gives you that hoppy taste.
Wine is more difficult. I have tried several good reds, but I have yet to discover one that is convincing enough to stand in for one with the alcohol still present. They all taste somewhat "grapey" and don't have the complex finish of the
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Serious question: beyond the hipster specialty beer value, are there people who actually drink beer for taste rather than alcohol content?
if by "hipster speciality" you mean the recent trend of homebrews, some are indeed very good but that's already subsiding and is just a tiny minority vs the huge variety of consolidated beers available in the whole spectrum of tastes. meaning actual beer. in the rest of the world beer isn't synonym of carbonated piss. that the likes of coors or anheuser are even considered "brewers" is a silly joke.
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"Serious question: beyond the hipster specialty beer value, are there people who actually drink beer for taste rather than alcohol content?"
Yes, and if that's a serious question, how stupid are you?
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Absolutely.
It's kind of ironic because my dad, a boomer, drank the cheap stuff like pabst blue ribbon and old milwaukee, because he probably just wanted the alcohol content cheap. When I came of age and shared a few cans I hated the stuff, even when going to college parties and drinking beer it was still something like Budweiser which I can drink but don't like either.
It wasn't until I moved states to start my career that I went out with some coworkers and they introduced me to Scottish Ale and Guinness' S
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beyond the hipster specialty beer value, are there people who actually drink beer for taste rather than alcohol content?
To me, it isn't so much that I like the taste than I don't like the taste of other things with it.
Have a beer. Then have a coke. Then have a beer again. Notice how your taste buds react to the switch. Not good.
Drinking something that at least tastes like beer, even without the alcohol, definitely "tastes better" than switching it for coke or a fruity non-alcoholic drink.
And, as you mention, it's getting harder to find beers in the 4-5% ABV that I'm used to. So being able to swap out with non=alcoholic
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"Serious question: beyond the hipster specialty beer value, are there people who actually drink beer for taste rather than alcohol content?"
Yes, there are lots of people that drink beer just for the taste, and not to get drunk. And svagdricka(similar to kvass), is regaining market share here in Sweden, as are several imported non-alcoholic malt beverages. New production techniques have also increased interest in the new non-alcoholic beers not just from a health viewpoint, but due to the fact that they now
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are there people who actually drink beer for taste rather than alcohol content?
I also asked myself this question the first fifty times I had a beer or so. Today, however, this question seems just ridiculous to me.
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I do.
In fact, I like beer flavor so much...that I brew my OWN beer.
I've gotten into it on the level of buying some really good equipment and brewing from all grain...milling my own grain.
I like being able to control the nuances of my beer via types of grain used, how much of each used and types of yeast....fermenting under pressure at times to be able to brew lager be
You dont' drink and you're out with friends (Score:1)
Also if you're used to drinking and have to give it up. I drink a pot of caffeine free coffee pretty much daily. Swiss water method so it's got less caffeine than a candy bar. I'm used to it. I had to stop drinking caffeinated stuff because I developed a weird "allergy" where it caused heart palpitations. But after 30+ years of drinking coffee I didn't want to give it up.
Re:Anheuser-Busch nonalcoholic beer outperforms... (Score:4, Interesting)
... non-alcoholic beer is pointless. What's the market?...those who want to get really fat really quickly and hold a beverage that looks like a beer at a party to the visually impaired so they don't stand out?
... So if you're drinking non-alcoholic beer, you're getting the weight gain purely for the flavor of beer? I actually like the taste of beer...but not enough to get fat drinking fake beer.
I'm not sure what non-alcoholic beers you have been looking at, but the ones I have found typically have less than half the calories and carbs of the alcoholic beers. Some are much less. And they still taste delicious.
Unless Anheuser Busch has really improved the flavor of their non-alcoholic beers in the last 20 years since I last tried one...it was never even close to their best-tasting beer. So I doubt it "tastes good". I doesn't get you buzzed and it has severe health consequences from the obesity.
See above. 20 years is a long time. Things have indeed changed. And look beyond Anheuser Busch to other brands, like Athletic Brewing, which specializes in non-alcoholic beers. Others are also good.
Re: Anheuser-Busch nonalcoholic beer outperforms.. (Score:2)
I drink a lot of Brew Dog AF. Itâ(TM)s not as good as their Punk IPA, but itâ(TM)s by far the best alcohol free beer Iâ(TM)ve found. I like beer, I just donâ(TM)t need the alcohol every time I want one.
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...because their regular beer sucks!!!!
If you don't like Pilsners you may think so. On the flip side if you do like pilsners you'll realise that brands attempt to make non-alcoholic beers that closely resemble their alcoholic ones. They are alcohol free pilsners. If you don't like them, you'll like these even less. Personally my go to non-alcoholic beer is an attempt to mimick a hoppy IPA.
Also, non-alcoholic beer is pointless. What's the market?...those who want to get really fat really quickly and hold a beverage that looks like a beer at a party to the visually impaired so they don't stand out?
Yep insult people rather than try and understand, great strategy. Some people love the taste of beer, like me, but can't stand the concept of being drunk all
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I rarely drink alcohol either - but it's not the problem of saying no to alcohol, it's that ALL the alternatives are sweet. Bitter might be high in calories, but it's not sweet. I also don't like fizzy drinks so when I'm out for a meal I'm often just drinking tap water. (because I rarely drink and because wines are so alcoholic nowadays and even a small glass is huge
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There is no safe amount of sunlight to consume. 8,000 people die of melanoma in the US every year.
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Which is why you'll find dermatologists who recommend putting on sunscreen as a part of your daily routine.
Aha! (Score:2, Funny)
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Not even funny - for both boys and girls, and later men and women... It's a way of suppressing inhibitions.
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I met her the same way!
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There's a "your mom" joke here, bit I'm going to steer clear of it.
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Slight tangent:
English doesn't have enough tenses. There needs to be an efficient way to say, "I met the woman who would later become my ex that way"... because obviously, she had yet to become your ex when you first met.
We need a prefix indicating "is now but wasn't at the time".
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Apparently my post wasn't clear enough for you, because I wasn't correcting the parent post.
Then again, maybe you're just a fucking reactionary idiot.
Re: Aha! (Score:2)
I met my future ex-wife that way. Itâ(TM)s concise and clear.
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Alcohol is conversation lubrication....
Re: Aha! (Score:2)
CA Sober -- It's moving on from alcohol (Score:4, Insightful)
It's because the population is starting to realize there are better ways to get "high" with less repercussions the next day, less calories/carbs, and less likely long term health issues than alcohol. One such way is Marijuana if you tolerate it well.
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Or maybe people like beer but were never attracted to the alcohol in the first place. My fridge is full of it for that reason. Sure today I capped the evening with a barrel aged icebock with 20% but I'll probably be drinking something alcohol free tomorrow, ... it's a school night.
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Building an issue step by step (Score:2)
There's a playbook already for this. The revenue stream grab by states is in place with Tobacco companies, and more recently NY state wants the same from oil companies.
1. Big profitable industry with a product having negative health effects or negative environmental effects
2. Hugely advertised products for decades
3. Large body of medical research showing negative health effects, environmental effects
4. Decades of statistical data on the health effects, cost to the government, social costs (jail time, accid
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Alcoholic Society (Score:2)
All the 20 and 30 year-olds that I know are obsessed with drinking alcohol. Perhaps because it was denied to them when they were younger, and represents and affirms their self-image as being "adults". As a result, they drink every day.
They are all drunks. They need the alcohol to interact socially, and they become very unpleasant when they drink. (They lose their inhibitions and their personality disorders, mainly driven by insecurities and whatever childhood traumas) take forefront. Usually this is aggress
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Statistics be damned, your personal anecdotes trump reality!
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Statistics aren't reality. They are abstract descriptions of some attribute of reality.
The results of surveys are statistical representations of how people answer the question on the survey. People lie. In particular, some people's answers to surveys like this are aspirational. The question is whether a higher percentage of people who drink lie saying they don't drink than the percentage of people that don't drink who lie and say they do. And how have those percentages changed.
There have always been peop
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Statistics aren't reality. They are abstract descriptions of some attribute of reality.
If you don't understand why statistics are vastly superior to anecdotes in terms of understanding the world we live in you need to go back to school as I'm done having to explain this to Slashdot users.
The results of surveys are statistical representations of how people answer the question on the survey. People lie. In particular, some people's answers to surveys like this are aspirational. The question is whether a higher percentage of people who drink lie saying they don't drink than the percentage of people that don't drink who lie and say they do. And how have those percentages changed.
These statistics are being compared to prior statistics of the same type so the rate of people lying should be the same between polling periods as we have no reason to believe this has changed. In other words, people lying doesnt change the fact that the numbers of people engaging in abstinence is growing.
By
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Ha, "abstinence". Obviously not what I meant, should have just been something to the effect of "not drinking".
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we have no reason to believe this has changed.
The entire article is about claims of change in the survey results. Where is the evidence that change in survey results is a product of changes in behavior and not just a change in how people answered the question? Given the claim that the change in behavior is a cultural shift, then you can project that same cultural shift as a reason for people to lie more often.
you don't understand why statistics are vastly superior to anecdotes in terms of understanding the world we live in
You don't understand statistics, they are neither superior nor inferior. They are just different information. But I am not going to argue matter
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You should go to your local college and talk to the social sciences people and tell them they're entire profession is "faith based". I'm sure the professors could use a laugh.
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talk to the social sciences people and tell them they're entire profession is "faith based".
Like I said, I don't argue questions of faith. In any case, they have already heard the arguments from people in the hard sciences.
Alcohol is an interesting one. (Score:5, Interesting)
Yes, it's a mutagen, but the nasty stuff is in the byproducts as the alcohol is processed by the liver. This raises an interesting question - is there something you can add to alcoholic drinks that changes how the alcohol is broken down or which limits the impact of the byproduct, say by binding specifically to it?
Pulque, for example, has a reputation for having a very different sort of effect on the brain to regular alcoholic drinks, but I can find no research to confirm this. Now, if the reputation has any kind of basis, then it follows there's some sort of change in the metabolism pathway.
Of course, the differing effect may be myth. But it doesn't alter the underlying principle. Since acetaldehyde is the nasty one (the others aren't nearly so problematic), all you need to do is accelerate its breakdown.
Binge watch some Dr. G, Medical Examiner (Score:2)
Alcohol is very very not good for you. In so, so many ways.
I personally can't see going for non-alcoholic versions of alcoholic drinks - e.g. does anybody actually like beer, unless it's through long association of linking the taste to the intoxication? - but if it helps get people off the alcohol, then great.
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I'll guess that you have a sweet tooth and, therefore, would only drink alcoholic drinks for the alcohol, preferring almost everything else - and even when you drink alcohol you'll probably go for mixers with a shot of vodka (or something like that) although depending on the company and your sex, you might not admit that that's what you want to drink.
OTOH, there are also many of us who don't have a sweet tooth, and drink alcoholic drinks for the taste despite the alcoh
Re: Binge watch some Dr. G, Medical Examiner (Score:2)
I like beer. I probably drink more AF than alcoholic beer these days too. You wonâ(TM)t get me drinking crap like Coke or Sprite.
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does anybody actually like beer
Give me a good non-alcoholic hefeweizen and I'd drink the shit out of it.
Whats the point? (Score:1)
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Try some non-alcoholic vodka today!
I wish I were joking.