Focus On Adult Soft Drinks: 7 December

Focus On: Adult soft drinks by Rob Brown and Natalie Brown

Download feature synopsis PDF here

Publishing: 7 December

Advert deadline: 27 November

Submissions deadline: 20 November

The Story

Ordering a G&T isn’t as simple as it used to be. Bars have an array of gins to cater for every imaginable preference. And the adult soft drink market is determined to make the tonic just as important in the equation. Take market leader Fever Tree, which has a gin and tonic pairing wheel on its site to encourage the perfect flavour combo. The Schweppes 1783 website includes a number of recipes for its range, which includes a Tonic & Pink Pepper and Ginger & Chilli variants. These recipes aren’t all about gin. Schweppes has a mixer designed especially for dark spirits, an area that inspired the launch of the Coca-Cola Signature Mixers in May. So how is this changing the adult soft drinks market? Are consumers making the mixers as important as the spirits? How much are shoppers willing to spend and who is driving growth and innovation?

Key themes:

Premium and craft: Mixer brands are finding success through craft and premium credentials. What’s driving demand for high end, artisanal mixers? What are these shoppers looking for, and who in the category is pushing the boat out in premium craft mixers?

Dark spirit mixers: How far has the dark spirit mixer sector come in the past year, and how could it develop in the year ahead?

Lemonade: How are these innovations influencing sales of standard mixers like lemonade, whose sales tumbled almost 50% this year? What other factors are at play here?

Cocktails: What are the main cocktail trends over the past year, and how have they impacted sales in the category? What could be the next big cocktail craze, and which sectors stand to benefit from it?

Kantar data on adult soft drinks: We explain the performance of the different sub-categories of the adult soft drinks market using Kantar commentary

Low and no alcohol beers, wines and spirits: What is going on in the low and no market? Who is winning, who is losing, and who is innovating?

Kantar data on spirits: Which spirits are seeing the most growth, or are tipped for big things? How is this impacting on adult soft drink sales?

Attitudes to plastic: Kantar’s Who Cares? Who Does? Report highlights a belief amongst shoppers that manufacturers should be tackling the plastic issue. Indeed, Kantar data shows plastic is the slowest growing format for tonic water this year, up just 4% compared to cans 13.1% and glass bottles’ 23%. Who in the category is swapping out of plastic, and who is sticking to their (plastic) guns?

Shopper Intelligence: How consumers shop the adult soft drinks market.

Innovations: We identify eight new products that have ideally not appeared in The Grocer before including launch date and RSP, and a picture of each.