When brewers visit one of Green Cheek Beer’s four locations in Southern California, odds are good that Evan Price will discuss hard seltzer.
“They’re just like, ‘Oh man, seltzer is just continuing to decline. Nobody wants it,’” says Price, a co-founder and brewer. “And I’m like, ‘Oh yeah, that’s the case, huh?’”
Among its medal-winning IPAs and pilsners, Green Cheek regularly offers multiple hard seltzers, including purple-tinted Lavender Lemonade. Some weeks, Lavender Lemonade will account for upward of 25 percent of taproom sales. “The amount of purple pitchers of Lavender Lemonade that go through the taproom is pretty dope,” Price says. “It absolutely crushes for us.”
Hard seltzer can seem like an also-ran, a fizzy pandemic-era phenomenon gone flat. Overall dollar sales of hard seltzer in the U.S. declined nearly 11 percent since last October, according to data shared with VinePair from market research firm NIQ. Yet, dark economics cloud a sunnier picture: In that same period, hard seltzer notched sales of more than $3.6 billion, according to NIQ, which is greater than the GDP of a couple dozen countries, including Grenada and Belize.
Topping the sales chart is the still-growing White Claw brand that controls some 65 percent of the category at the expense of shrinking competitors like Truly Hard Seltzer, which is down more than 20 percent this year.
Those hard seltzer brands broke wide as a broadly appealing commodity that looked clearly different, becoming an easy-to-enjoy answer to all that complex craft beer. As a business move for craft breweries, making hard seltzer seemed smart on the surface. Ferment some sugar, hit 100 calories, add lime flavor, and watch that bottom line bubble up.
But the market quickly grew crowded, and differentiation is difficult when every hard seltzer looks and tastes the same. Craft breweries are now learning from missteps and leaning into creativity, clawing out market share through unique flavor combinations, targeted distribution, and a seasonal approach.
Breaking Free From 100-Calorie Template Is Good for Business
Hard seltzer found success by adhering to a strict numerical template coated in a better-for-you veneer. A 12-ounce slim can of leading brands like White Claw typically contains 100 calories and 5 percent ABV, with a couple grams of carbohydrates and sugar. Get gluten-free wasted, with no worries about your waistline!
Caloric restriction comes with a cost, though, and that’s often flavor. Many hard seltzers taste like lightly boozy LaCroix. Pleasantly satisfying, sure, but rarely memorable.
Greek Cheek first approached hard seltzer from the “White Claw model,” Price says, creating a neutral base flavored with tinctures, and no sugar added after fermentation. The brewery’s spinoff hard seltzer brand, Le Squawk, debuted in summer 2020 with lime, tangerine, and passion fruit flavors.
“They were just so bland and didn’t do well,” Price says. “Nobody cared.”
“It’s just sugar water that you ferment to make alcoholic water, and then you add whatever flavors you want.”
The brewery silenced Le Squawk and performed a postmortem. Why focus on cutting calories and carbs? “We’re not trying to make a fitness drink,” Price says. “That isn’t our clientele.”
Freed from arbitrary constraints, Green Cheek created a new hard seltzer recipe featuring dried French lavender pods, a lemon tincture, and cane sugar for sweet balance. “We went back to the drawing board and started working on things that taste delicious,” Price says.
For brewers, a big upside of hard seltzer is its inherent neutrality. Brewing a beer with barley will create a grain flavor that a brewer might accentuate (stouts, barley wines) or mask (New Belgium Voodoo Ranger Fruit Force, Modelo’s Chelada line). A clean hard seltzer base can act as a neutral platform for experimentation.
“It’s just sugar water that you ferment to make alcoholic water, and then you add whatever flavors you want,” says Emma Christensen, the author of “Hard Seltzer, Iced Tea, Kombucha, and Cider: How to Make Your Own Boozy Fermented Drinks,” which will be released in April. “Once you see the possibilities, you can go anywhere.”
“Our mentality is that we like these products, they taste really good, and we have enough customers that enjoy them as well. It fits a nice niche for the brewery.”
For breweries, this can mean embracing a more seasonal approach to hard seltzer. “Everybody thought seltzers were a summer drink and that was it,” says Tom Korder, a co-founder and the head brewer at Penrose Brewing in Geneva, Ill., which makes Seltz-Up hard seltzers. “We’re leaning into a seasonal rotation.”
During the summer, Penrose will release a hard seltzer inspired by the Transfusion, a golf-course cocktail flavored with grapes, ginger, and lime, while fall welcomes an Apple Cider Donut Seltz-Up. A new Seltz-Up flavor can generate the got-to-try-it excitement once associated with hazy IPAs.
“We see an uptick in our taproom traffic,” Korder says.
Aiming Local Is Key for Sales
Craft beer arose as a flavor-driven, locally rooted rejoinder to the dominance of domestic light lager. Here’s a beer that tastes different, brewed right down the road. As hard seltzer evolves, locality is increasingly a key selling point.
Dominic Minogue developed the 90-calorie Dirty Water hard seltzer for a highly specific habitat, the New York City dive bar. He’s earned placements for the “light beer of hard seltzer.”
Seventh Son Brewing of Columbus, Ohio, introduced Kitty Paw hard seltzers in 2019, using fruit purées like pineapple, tangerine, guava, and Key lime to deliver big flavors and eye-catching tints. Local competitors are scant. “As far as made-in-Columbus hard seltzer, Kitty Paw is the only one,” says head brewer Colin Vent.
Sales have decelerated from the peak, when distributors might sell 40 cases a day, but the brewery still sells around 10 cases a day. Kitty Paw remains a menu staple at Seventh Son’s taproom, where it’s a go-to gluten-free option, and area bars including Cobra and Pins Mechanical. “Our mentality is that we like these products, they taste really good, and we have enough customers that enjoy them as well,” Vent says. “It fits a nice niche for the brewery.”
Dominic Minogue developed the 90-calorie Dirty Water hard seltzer for a highly specific habitat, the New York City dive bar. He’s earned placements for the “light beer of hard seltzer,” as he calls it, at legendary dives like Welcome to the Johnsons on the Lower East Side, while Heart of Gold in Astoria, Queens, offers the Dirty Water Dog happy hour deal — that is, a Dirty Water and a hot dog. “On-premise is where Dirty Water really shines,” Minogue says.
With the Quirk hard-seltzer family, Boulevard Brewing of Kansas City, Mo., is carving out a much larger niche in the Midwest. The brewery sells more than 90 percent of its Quirk volume in just 10 states, including Missouri, Kansas, and contiguous states including Iowa and Nebraska.
“We do not have aims to be a national brand by design,” says Ali Bush, the vice president of marketing, adding that dollar sales of Quirk are up 11 percent so far this year.
Boulevard built the “Quirkdom,” as it calls its core sales region, by developing compelling flavors combos, such as cherry blossom and lime, alongside the nostalgic Popsicle-inspired Raspberry Rocket Pop and stronger Raspberry Rocket Booster. To deepen local ties, Boulevard partnered with baseball’s Kansas City Royals on Blueberry Slam hard seltzer, while Celly Juice, a malt-based Quirktail, is served at Kansas City Current soccer games.
“We’re the clear No. 1 hard seltzer brand in our home market,” Bush says.
Next year, Boulevard will expand Quirk with gluten-free hard teas built around a seltzer base, plus a hard seltzer inspired by rainbow sherbet. Not drinking? Sip a nonalcoholic Quirk Superfruit Seltzer flavored with açaí berries and yellow papaya. “We really believe that the seltzer shopper prioritizes innovation,” Bush says.
At Green Cheek, Price is experimenting with cocktail-inspired hard seltzers like a Paloma and the sort of strong Gin and Tonic served at dive bars with a black straw. The hard seltzers are only sold at the brewery, meeting the needs of taproom customers and not an ever-fickle marketplace.
Says Price, “It’s not like we’re trying to take over the world.”
This story is a part of VP Pro, our free platform and newsletter for drinks industry professionals, covering wine, beer, liquor, and beyond. Sign up for VP Pro now!
