Jamie Matthewson, General Manager, Packaged Food and Drink, Woolworths New Zealand, has been in the beverage industry for nearly 15 years, and this move to no/low alcohol is, without question, the biggest change he has seen.
Around two to three decades ago, the only non-alcoholic option was a beer called Kaliber, which Matthewson said wasn't great. Now, consumers have access to a fantastic range of beers that taste good, such as XIPA, Hazy IPA, Lager, wheat beers, and more.
Low- and no-alcohol drinks have penetrated the category, and they are well and truly in consumers’ repertoires now for different reasons. Some have specific occasions when they want to have low- or no-alcohol, some don't want to drink alcohol at all, but want to replicate a beer, wine or spirits, while others are ‘zebra striping.’
Although in terms of volume and sales, the low- and no-category is a small area, it's still important. For example, beer is about four percent down over the last year, but low/no alcohol beer is about five percent up, on a much smaller volume. Matthewson said the category remains in good growth, unlike traditional alcoholic beer, which is a challenged market, and he also wasn’t convinced about the future of non-alcoholic wine.
He explained that with low/no beer, there is an opportunity to create something that tastes pretty much like beer, which is why consumers enjoy it, and the same is true for non-alcoholic spirits, non-alcoholic cocktails, and non-alcoholic RTDs.
With wine, he said, it's much more difficult, hence the growth in lighter styles such as five to eight percent wines.
“I think we might have hit peak non-alcoholic wine. I think non-alcoholic wine probably needs something different now. Maybe we open up the legislation to allow adjuncts [additives] to make it a different product, a wine-based drink, a cocktail or something like that.”
Another major trend he has observed was lower consumption but high spending.
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