First, What is Going On With Hard Seltzer?
Hard seltzer is carbonated water combined with alcohol (i.e. アルコール入り炭酸水) and natural or artificial flavorings. Most hard seltzer brands use cane sugar (サトウキビ, orケーンシュガー), although some beverages do use malted barley. As a result, hard seltzer is generally gluten-free and contains fewer calories and grams of sugar than other alcoholic drinks.
Truly Hard Seltzer is not the first brand to market. However, it is considered an early pioneer (For more information about how Truly came to be and how Boston Beer, the company behind Truly Hard Seltzer, approaches product innovation click here.)
Growth in the hard seltzer market has been red hot in recent years, driving growth at major brewing companies. And Truly Hard Seltzer, which is owned by Boston Beer, has played a large role in driving growth for its company. Between 2017 and 2020, revenue at Boston Beer practically doubled.
(Image: Truly Hard Seltzer Pomegranate)
What Happened to Truly?
Growth in Q2 of 2021 missed expectations, despite Truly releasing a big marketing campaign with popstar Dua Lipa. On a positive note, the Truly brand grew more than twice as fast as the hard seltzer category in Q2, and it closed the market share gap with number one brand White Claw.1 However, in reaction to the downgraded outlook, shares of Boston Beer dropped 26%.2
One reason cited for the decline in sales growth was a decrease in new trial. A second reason cited for depletion declines was the rising number of competitors.
Is There Really That Much Competition?
Yes, there are a lot of new hard seltzer brands on the market. For example, Warheads is now in the hard seltzer game. The candy designed to make your face pucker has teamed up with brewery Artisan Brew Works on 5 different flavors sure to excite those longing for a wild whiff of nostalgia.3 Sonic Drive-In is also in the hard seltzer game. They’ve introduced hard seltzer flavors inspired by their “famous” slushies.4
To Fizz Or Not To Fizz (fan fiction by Truly & Hamlet)
To fizz or not to fizz, that was today’s “The Global Lowdown” question.
Is it nobler to focus on our own accomplishments as the second largest player in the hard seltzer space and ignore our position adjacent to the mighty tides of White Claw? Or, is it bolder to maximize the moment, to fight the good fight for top category market share? And, in doing so, to unseat Mark Anthony’s foamy grip.
Ah … but what if want to give it all away? What if we leave the SEC behind, and the heartache of missed income expectations, earnings call examinations, and stale inventory purgatory that countless untouched seltzer cans are forgotten for?
The relief of stress, the resuscitation of mental health and physical well-being is what organizational psychologists might wish for. That is, to be content in the category as at most number two and to tell off investors until next year. Adjust our mindset to be a bit more complacent, and go on a monthlong August holiday.
Ah, but then fear sets in again. For in that seltzer salesmanship slumber what awful things may come? Could we truly bear the loss of market share, the decline in annual bonuses, the nabbing questioning of decisions we did not make?
Fighting for the top is worth fighting for. Of ourselves, of our shareholders, millionaires, no billionaires, we shall make - soft, we are not!
Fizz Fizz Biz. It’s Something Hard To Explain. Always Mysterious. Yet, it’s Always the Same.
https://www.craftbrewingbusiness.com/featured/boston-beer-bet-wrong-on-trulys-growth-so-is-hard-seltzer-over/
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/boston-beer-earnings-losing-fizz-153657355.html
https://hypebeast.com/2021/8/warheads-spiked-seltzer-release
https://www.thrillist.com/news/nation/sonic-hard-seltzer-flavors-released