Prepare yourself: 2016 will be the year of the Hard Soda

By Adam T. Schick for Indiana On Tap

Will 2016 be the year of Flavored Malt Beverages (FMB)? It’s sure starting to seem that way.

With the explosive success of Not Your Father’s Root Beer, a surgary sweet root beer-flavored alcoholic beverage that you’ve surely seen on shelves at your local shops and large grocery chains alike, large national players took notice and will soon flood the market with their takes on the style. AB InBev’s Best Damn Root Beer can already be found taking up space in the beer aisle, and MillerCoors’ will launch Henry’s Hard Ginger Ale and Henry’s Hard Orange Soda in January 2016.

The launch will mimic the launch and marketing scope of the company’s Red’s Apple Ale in 2014.

“FMB is something that has established itself and continues to grow, and we really believe that hard soda is the next segment to evolve,” Bryan Ferschinger, senior director of Innovation for MillerCoors told CNBC.

FMB have not-so-slowly become large players in the alcohol industry. In 2015 I’ve seen Not Your Father’s Root Beer (a beverage with questionable origins itself, including a shady link to the maker of Four Loko, Phusion Projects, LLC) served alongside, or replace outright, the general Miller/Bud/Coors offerings at parties, barbeques, and picnics. Its sweetness appeals to the macro beer crowd and Gen-X alike, crowds that either avoid the diverse flavors of craft beer or simply prefer sweeter drinks altogether.

“One of the things that’s helping this whole area is that Gen X really grew up as the soda generation and when you talk to a Gen X-er, 74 percent still consume soda,” added Ferschinger to CNBC. 

I am generally in favor of people drinking whatever tastes good to them, for the most part. I won’t begrudge a macro drinker their preferences towards macro beers (there’s a time and a place for them, I believe) and will usually offer an easy drinking craft alternative then let the point die. This goes beyond taste preferences though. Just like AB InBev’s recent acquisitions of famous craft breweries, this is about shelf space. 

The popularity of Not Your Father’s Root Beer (now in a partnership with Pabst Brewing Co.) has inspired copycats from the world’s largest beer and distribution companies, who are all hungry to get in on the latest craze. NYFRB is even diversifying, adding Not Your Father’s Ginger Ale to its portfolio in 2016. The resources (money, distribution networks, taplines, etc.) afforded to these products made by the same behemoths the craft beer industry has been fighting since its birth will continue to be made more limited for our local craft brewers.

Less taplines plus less shelf space equals less profit for places that rely on you being able to see their product more than anything. I know my local shop has already taken space away from Indiana brewries to make room for the macro giants latest products. The more demand for these products grows, the more money is poured into the pockets of MillerCoors and the like, who have convinced us that this product is actually different (look at the cutesy mom-and-pop-shop looking packaging! It’s not sold directly next to the 30 rack of Natty Light so it CAN’T be macro!).

What we’re essentially being sold is a different flavor of Zima. 

The FMB mission is really about one thing and one thing only: continuing the mission of limiting our access to locally made craft beer. It gives macro makers yet another product to place on shelves while they muddy up their connections with the beverages and their producers. For example: Coney Island Hard Rootbeer is made by Coney Island Brewing, a subsidiary of Boston Beer Company, who is techinically a craft brewer but is hardly fighting the same fight as Bloomington Brewing Company, Black Acre, and Bare Hands. 

Craft brewers will continue to make amazing beers to share with us, while continuing to fight against macro makers as they always have. The least we can do is make informed decisions about our purchases to give them a fighting chance. ​​