Beyond Beer

Ready-to-drink canned cocktail maker Ohza has closed a $4 million funding round led by CircleUp Growth Partners. The financing is expected to help the brand scale nationwide as it partners with distributors such as Southern Glazer’s Wine & Spirits and Breakthru Beverage group.

Sugar-based hard seltzers are now considered malt beverages in Oregon and will be taxed accordingly, ending the state’s discrepancy with the federal government’s classification of the popular bubbly beverages.

More than 75% of beer wholesalers said the summer selling season is off to “a strong start,” as Memorial Day trends either met or exceeded expectations, Goldman Sachs analyst Bonnie Herzog found in her latest “Beverage Bytes survey” of about 40 distributors covering 145,000 retail outlets (about a quarter of the total U.S. outlets that sell alcoholic beverages).

Leading hard kombucha brewery JuneShine announced the completion of Series A funding today, led by several celebrity investors.

Efforts to equalize the tax rate for ready-to-drink canned cocktails with beer in New Jersey have picked up steam in recent weeks.

Consumers used the long weekend to sneak in an extra round with friends and family — and many purchased those drinks online. Sales on alcohol delivery on-demand marketplace Drizly spiked 30% on the Sunday of Memorial Day weekend, compared to the previous four Sundays in May, the company shared. The hard seltzer segment reached a 28% share of overall beer category sales during the holiday weekend, an increase of 3% over its overall share for the month.

Everybody’s talking about RTDs, and for good reason. The ready-to-drink (RTD) beverage alcohol segment is absolutely exploding, with that growth triggering a slew of new brands and products entering the market.

Brew Talks video replay is now available. Beyond beer offerings continue to be the growth driver within the beer category. Boston Beer’s Dave Burwick, Lone River Beverage Company’s Katie Beal Brown and Manhattan Beer’s Ed McBrien discuss the opportunities within the so-called “fourth category” of offerings.

Just how big a part of the beer category could hard seltzer be by 2025? It depends on who you ask. During this month’s Beverage Forum, Anthony Von Mandl and Jim Koch, the leaders of the companies that produce the two largest hard seltzer brands, White Claw and Truly, respectively, offered differing projections, according to analysts’ reports.

Lunar co-founders Sean Ro and Kevin Wong were a couple drinks in, reminiscing about the “before times” — when COVID-19 hadn’t locked down the country, halting travel — when they thought up their next flavor launch for their up-and-coming hard seltzer brand.

Heineken and several of its subsidiaries have dropped their trademark infringement complaint against Biscayne Bay Brewing and signed a covenant not to sue the Miami-based craft brewery. “The parties have jointly agreed to resolve their trademark dispute,” a Heineken spokesperson told Brewbound.

While they may be restrictive with distribution, the Atlanta-headquartered company is anything but with their product line-up, transitioning from a craft brewery into a total beverage company.

At present, malt- and sugar-based RTDs, such as Mark Anthony Brands’ White Claw and Boston Beer Company’s Truly Hard Seltzer, can be sold at beer distributors, which offer retail beer sales. Wine-based RTDs are available at Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board-run (PLCB) stores and off-premise retailers licensed to sell wine. However, spirits-based RTDs are only available via the PLCB’s stores.

Lone River Ranch Water announced the expansion of their distribution in 21 states this summer.