Beer Marketer's Insights - Flavored Alc Bev RTDs Near $10.1 Bil for 52 Wks; High Noon, Buzzballz, Cutwater & BeatBox Climbing Ranks

Total flavored alc bev RTDs grew $$ 7% to nearly $10.1 bil for 52 wks thru Dec 16 in NielsenIQ xAOC + c-stores (excluding liquor stores), according to data shared in Goldman Sachs analyst Bonnie Herzog's latest report. (This includes FMBs, hard seltzer, hard cider, plus spirit-based and wine-based RTDs.) In broader view of the beer category that includes spirit and wine-based RTDs, total flavored alc bev RTDs have over 21 share in these channels. FMBs and malt/sugar hard seltzers still make up over 3/4 of RTD alc bevs, including FMBs up 19% to $4.4 bil and hard seltzers down 16% to $3.2 bil for 52 wks, according to Bonnie's report. But seltzer's decline wiped out most of FMB's gain, collectively the 2 segments up just 1%. Spirit-based and wine-based RTDs continue climbing the ranks with spirit RTDs up 43% to $1.4 bil and wine-based RTDs up nearly 21% to $560 mil in tracked off-prem channels. Both segments are now considerably bigger than hard cider, +3.5% to $465 mil, despite their more limited availability.Four key brands keep rising most of all among flavored alc bev brands: High Noon, Buzzballz, Cutwater and BeatBox. High Noon grew 56% to $386 mil for 52 wks thru Dec 16. That makes High Noon 6th largest RTD brand overall, behind only White Claw ($1.85 bil), Twisted Tea ($1.1 bil), Mike's ($749 mil), Truly ($725 mil), and Smirnoff Ice ($507 mil), report suggests. Buzzballz wine-based cocktails soared 37% to $164 mil. That's 10th largest flavored alc bev brand family overall, bigger than Four Loko and nearly as big as Topo Chico hard seltzer. Cutwater is a top-15 RTD brand fam as sales jumped 39% to $126 mil in this dataset. Ahead of Redd's and Fireball FMBs ($110 mil each) plus Jack Daniel's FMBs ($108 mil) among others. And BeatBox surged 164% to surpass $102 mil. Now among top-20 RTD brands in scans. Nearly as large as the other top wine-based RTD brand, Rancho La Gloria (down 6% to $103 mil) and Monster's new Beast Unleashed FMBs ($91 mil) for 52 wks.Spirit-Based White Claw & Truly Each Reached ~$20 Mil; Truly Vodka Sodas -16% for 4 Wks White Claw and Truly's new spirit-based RTDs each made solid inroads into the bustling spirit RTD space in year 1. Collectively they snagged 3 share of spirit RTDs in scans with White Claw Vodka Soda reaching $23 mil and Truly cocktails at $20 mil for 52 wks thru Dec 16. White Claw seltzer trend improved 1.3 pts to +4% including spirit-based versions; Truly trend improved 2 pts but still down 25% for period. Both Mark Anthony and Boston Beer are doubling down on spirit-based RTD space thru White Claw and Truly tequila sodas, new packages and other newer brands. But Truly Vodka Sodas still struggling to lap last year's initial launch (see Nov 29), down 16% for 4 wks thru Dec 16 vs +559% for 52 wks.

Flavored Alc Bev RTDs Near $10.1 Bil for 52 Wks; High Noon, Buzzballz, Cutwater & BeatBox Climbing Ranks

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