Why are there so many anti-alcohol stories appearing in the media? One of the harshest critics of the anti-alcohol movement is Christopher Snowdon, Head of Lifestyle Economics at the free market think tank Institute of Economic Affairs in the UK. In this wide-ranging discussion, we delve into the anti-alcohol movement, exploring its implications on personal freedoms and public health.

Topics covered include:

1. The history of the modern anti-alcohol movement and how it rose from the ashes of Prohibition;
2. The system of grants that sustains it;
3. The Total Consumption Model of alcohol, which suggests that the only way to help heavy drinkers is to get everybody to stop drinking;
4. The “commercial determinants of health” and why governments like the idea; and
5. Why alcohol policies often fail. 

Relevant documents:

• The World Health Organization and their Commercial Determinants of Health document.
• The work of Professor Tim Stockwell, whose meta-analyses that dispute the existence of the J-curve have received huge media attention. You’ll find Chris Snowdon’s criticisms here.
• The doomed MACH (Moderate Alcohol and Cardiovascular Health) trial.  

While many entrepreneurs are backing away slowly from both the wine industry and China, Don St Pierre Jr is rushing back in — because he sees plenty of opportunity.

In 1996, two Don St Pierres — senior and junior — changed the world of wine forever when they founded ASC Fine Wines in Shanghai.

Don St. Pierre Snr saw an opportunity in wine: as he later wrote about China’s 1.2 billion population, “all of these folks had to drink and eat something.”

Before long, the St Pierres were distributing Beringer and Bollinger, among other fine wines. They pretty much singlehandedly established China’s fine wine market.

Don St Pierre Jr. retired from the business in 2015, and shortly after became CEO and co-owner of California’s Vinfolio. Don St Pierre Sr died in 2023.

Recently Don St Pierre Jr founded AdaptEdge, an investment and advisory company. One of its first investments was in Vino Joy News, the media company founded by Natalie Wang.

And on St Pierre emains bullish on China, even though wine consumption there peaked in 2017. In this podcast, he explains why he believes so strongly in the country, and why he remains so optimistic about the wine industry in general.

In this wide-ranging conversation he reveals:

1. Why he loves family-run companies and how he evaluates them
2. How digital innovation can resolve some of the distribution bottleneck problems
3. Why producers and businesses elsewhere should be taking inspiration from China
4. How to research the Chinese market
5. Insights from the Harvard Innovation Lab

As always, the takeaways will be in the newsletter, which you can sign up for at drinksinsider.com

Rowena Curlewis is the woman behind some of the most iconic designs in the drinks space — not only has she worked on brands like Penfolds and 19 Crimes, but she recently created the labels for Dolly Wines, the first wines released by legend Dolly Parton.

Rowena is, with Margaret Nolan, the co-founder of Denomination Design, a brand design agency headquartered in Sydney, with offices in San Francisco and London.

In this conversation, she covers everything from current trends, to collaborations with fashion designers, to how to make a bottle stand out:

1. Connect through storytelling

Storytelling takes consumers down a path where they will fall in love with your brand. Authenticity is an important quality signal.

2. The name is everything

How will the product look on a wine list? When it’s written up on a chalkboard? Does the name jump out? Is it easy to pronounce? All these things will prompt the customer to buy it.

3. If you can get the consumer to pick up the bottle...

...it’s now much more likely that they will buy the product. If they like it, they’re more likely to buy it again, because once they’ve handled it, they’ve built a sensory memory around it that will give them a feeling of trust.

4. Design differently for the dark

If your product is going to be served in a dark bar at night, you need to consider how the bartender or sommelier will find it. Spirits brands are very good at creating distinctive shapes, so that people can tell what the bottle is, just by touch.

5. Don’t forget the capsule

The capsule does a lot more work than people realise, particularly if the bottle is going to sit in an ice bucket, or it’s going to poke from a rack. The capsule may be the only thing that customers get to see, so use that space effectively.

For the full takeaways from this episode, sign up to the Drinks Insider newsletter.

How do you break into a category that’s completely dominated by one major, very cashed-up player?

If you’re Tyson Branz Destileria Barako Corp, you test the local market and build up a fan base who spread the word wherever they go, helping to do the marketing for you.

In this episode, Tyson explains how he and his team developed Ube Cream Liqueur, and how they turned it into an export dynamo by turning locals into true fans. He covers:

1. Why entering competitions is a good strategy

The power of a medal can open doors and he explains how and why.

2. Trade fairs versus the direct approach

There’s a time to run a booth at a trade fair, and a time to get out and meet people. Tyson explains how he decided on his trade strategy.

3. Know the occasion for your brand

Destileria Barako is in the Philippines, where people consume alcohol in a very particular way. By knowing how the drink would be consumed, the team turned Ube into the must-have party drink.

4. Identify your export market

Sometimes it’s not the country you need to target, but the ex-pat community within that country. Here’s how and why to do it — and how to respect your target audience.

5. Market data vs gut instinct

When to pull the trigger and launch a new product.

What’s better than marketing your brand yourself? Getting other people to talk about your brand. The more (positive) attention you get, the easier it is to get people to try your product, and to convince distributors, retailers and the off-trade to stock it.

The man who knows more about this than just about anybody else in the US is Gino Colangeo, founder of Colangelo & Partners, which has a huge team dedicated to promoting wine and spirits and offices in New York, San Francisco and Miami.

He’s also a great storytelling and in this lively episode, Gino gives plenty of useful insights into the do’s and don’ts of spreading your message through both traditional media and social media channels:

1. Prepare yourself before you dive in

What do you need in place before you start a PR campaign? How much money? What time period do you need to plan for?

2. When to target trade media vs when to target consumer

There’s the right time to target sales channels through the trade media, and a better time to engage with consumers through mainstream press and social media. Gino offers tips on working out which channel to use and when.

3. You need targeted pitches

If your PR agency is sending out mass press releases, they may be wasting your time and money. What usually works better is the personalised pitch — but how do you get in front of those powerful gatekeepers?

4. Are you in the right place?

Everybody wants national distribution, but working state by state might be a better strategy. But in this case, how do you know which states to tackle first?

5. You need social media

Brands that don’t have a social media presence lack credibility. Gino explains why.

All this and more in this very insightful and fast-paced episode.

Neha Kumar knows a lot about money and finance. As well as a background in banking, and plenty of corporate experience, she also lectures at UCLA’s Anderson School of Management and collaborates with the Women’s Abundance Collective, teaching high-net-worth women the ins and outs of investing and deal-making. 

And, at a time when wine sales are wobbling, she’s raised $14 million to invest in her company, Full Glass Wine, which is on a mission to build the next wave of direct-to-consumer brands in the space. Acquisitions include Winc, Bright Cellars and Wine Insiders.

In this episode, she explains why she’s so optimistic about the future of wine DTC and:

1. The value of data

How using data effectively can help refine operations and present the correct wine to the right market.

2. Why you need to move faster

The industry works on razor-thin margins, which means wine companies have to be swift and responsive, and test, grow or discard ideas faster than is other industries.

3. How to present choices to consumers in a meaningful way

Too much choice can paralyze consumers, but not enough will feel flexible and rigid. Neha explains how to create the happy medium.

4. The role of convenience

Pack size is everything in this game, and it’s worth reconsidering the traditional 3-, 6- and 12-bottle format.

5. The right model for multiple businesses

How do you build brands that will appeal to different demographics, without cannibalising any of them? There are simple models for that!

The U.S. beverage market is the most lucrative in the world — if your product is a hit, your money worries will (mostly) be over. But the post-pandemic market is undergoing a structural shift, with beverage alcohol declining and consumers wanting new flavors on a regular basis.

In this episode, Kaleigh Theirault of NielsenIQ tracks the changes, from the rise of canned cocktails to the emergence of new categories:

1. Why and how consumers are moving to the off-premise

At-home consumption of wine, beer, spirits and other drinks is rising. Is this just because people are still overstocked from the pandemic? Or is there something deeper going on?

2. Consumers are divided

The economy is great — for some people. Those people are out enjoying themselves, lining the bar and filling restaurant seats. Another group feels like they’re falling behind. The drinks preferences of both groups are diverging.

3. More choices, more fragmentation

Back in the pre-pandemic days, consumers would think of themselves primarily as wine drinkers, beer drinkers, or as belonging to some other category. But as choices have widened, the mental barriers have fallen, and consumers are now ready to try everything — with consequences for producers.

4. Things are speeding up

To capture consumers, producers have to work harder and faster. New flavors, new products and new offerings of all kinds. As the product cycle shortens, how can producers keep up?

5. Wine consumption is falling

While older consumers still reach for their Cabernet and Chardonnay, younger consumers prefer cocktails. Is this just a short-term trend — or is it structural?

All this and more in one fact-packed episode.

Entrepreneur and co-founder Marian Leitner-Waldman has single handedly overcome all the problems facing the wine industry. Archer Roose has a thriving audience of young consumers, who can’t get enough of high-quality wine in cans and bagnums, which appear in more than 6,000 outlets.

The reason that sales are up 35% year-on-year? The brand is built on a combination of high-quality wine, total transparency, and plenty of data.

In this fascinating episode, Marian talks about:

1. How wine-loving investors failed to see the market opportunity sitting right in front of them.
2. How Archer Roose launched without institutional funding.
3. How and why she partners with celebrity Elizabeth Banks, even though she says that celebrity brands are dead.
4. What beer distributors know about getting cans into hands, that wine distributors need to know.
5. What the wine industry is getting wrong about young people.
6. How Archer Roose opened up completely new markets, from cinemas to stadiums.
7. The issues surrounding cans and how Archer Roose solved them.

Not only is Marian a fount of useful knowledge and advice, she’s also a great speaker. Tune in to learn more — and all the takeaways can be found in the Drinks Insider newsletter. Sign up for it here.

Why do winemakers add chemicals to wine? Are these additives dangerous? How do we know? And why do winemakers take the risk?

The person who knows more about this topic than almost anybody alive is pharmacologist and toxicologist Creina Stockley, who has been not just in research, but in the regulatory process. In this episode, she delves into the use of additives and processing aids in winemaking, and explains how they’re developed, why winemakers use them, and what it takes to get them through the regulatory process. 

Health policy

Creina has also had a front seat to worldwide discussions about wine and health, from the uprush of research in the 1990s, to the current situation. She discusses the politics of research and funding, and how we know what we do about the impact of wine and other alcohol on human health.

The conversation covers:

1. What additives and processing aids are, and why they are used.
2. How additives and processing aids get regulatory approval.
3. The impact on human health.
4. Alcohol consumption guidelines
5. Role of epidemiological studies
6. Cultural differences in alcohol consumption
7. How the focus of research shifted

Increased sales of more than 40%. High customer loyalty. And the ability to spot a customer who’s about to unsubscribe.

As Ben Gibson explains, there is still plenty of growth to be found in direct-to-consumer sales. He’s the founder of WineHub, the wine and spirits plug- in for Shopify, which is enabling exponential growth in wine sales.

Ben explains how and why he created WineHub, and explains how wineries can use the tool to increase their average order value and maintain customer relationships. Ben also discusses the importance of having a loyalty programme and how it can help retain customers. He shares insights on the changing demographics of wine consumers and the opportunities for growth in the wine industry.

There is a massive fight brewing in the United States, and it's over the question of how much alcohol people can safely drink.

Every five years the US government updates its dietary guidelines, and in that process outlines what the limits of alcohol consumption should be.

The process has been fraught, with claims and counter-claims of bias and irregular dealings.

David Clement, North American Affairs Manager for Canada’s Consumer Choice Center, based in Ontario, saw the exact same fight play out, involving some of the same scientists. At the time, he wrote about what happened for the Canadian media.

In this lively episode, he discusses:

1. What happened in Canada and what it means for the U.S.
2. The pushback from addiction specialists
3. The rise of anti-alcohol groups and their impact on public health
4. A look at Movendi, the Swedish temperance group turned public health NGO
5. The politics of public health

Relevant articles:

What does science tell us about hangovers? Frustratingly, very little is known about them, apart from the economic havoc they wreak.

But everyone who has experienced them knows exactly how evil they are. Wouldn’t it be great if it was possible to drink without any side effects?

Professor David Nutt, a neuropsychopharmacologist, has been hard at work on that very thing. In this episode, he discusses the work he’s doing on a molecule called Alcarelle, which is currently going through regulatory testing. In the meantime, he’s introduced a vermouth-like drink called Sentia to market.

In this episode, Felicity Carter and Dave, as he likes to be known, talk about how alcohol affects the brain, the misery of hangovers, and how Dave devised and created Sentia, and brought it to market.

The conversation covers:

1. Hangovers and what we don’t know about them
2. How alcohol affects the brain
3. How ancient herbal remedies may hold the secret to creating alcohol substitutes
4. The rise of functional drinks
5. How to bring a new drink to market
6. The market potential for non-alcoholic drinks
7. The future of alcohol itself

Alcohol consumption is predicted to drop precipitously in the next five years. What actions should wineries (and distilleries) take to ensure their business is one of those that comes out the other side in good financial shape? What opportunities are there for wine-adjacent products?

In this episode, wine data guru Lulie Halstead shares insights on branding, consumer behavior, and practical research tactics, offering valuable advice for wine enterprises of all sizes.

1. Projected decline in wine consumption
2. Impact of generational shifts
3. Premiumization trends
4. Market orientation over product orientation:
5. Distinctiveness versus differentiation
6. Diverse consumer preferences
7. Leveraging market research
8. The potential of wine-adjacent products
9. Challenges in low-or-no alcohol wines
10. Spirits diversification and globalization

Lulie co-founded Wine Intelligence and is regarded as a leading thinker in the world of wine business strategy. Prior to co-founding Wine Intelligence, she developed expertise in the wine industry, with hands-on roles in importing, marketing and retailing. She is an established marketing academic, focusing on wine consumer behaviour and continues to teach and supervise on master’s programs around the world. Alongside her passions for food and wine, she focuses on exploring what makes consumers behave the way they do. She specializes in qualitative research practices and trend research, constantly developing new ways to uncover the processes of the subconscious mind. Lulie is a frequent and valued speaker at many international wine industry and academic conferences around the world.

How do you turn your customers into fans? How do you even connect with your customers—and how do you do it if you have a wildly diverse customer group?

The man to ask is Justin Noland, who recently became VP of Digital Experience at Treasury Americas. Treasury Wine Estates is a multi-national company headquartered in Australia, which has 20 wine brands in its portfolio including the blockbuster 19 Crimes and some luxury brands.

Justin is an acknowledged expert in all things digital, and in this wide-ranging conversation he talks about everything from wine as entertainment, to whether demographics are a useful way to segment the market.

We’re going to talk about wine, obviously, but this is a conversation that is relevant across the beverage space, whether you’re in spirits, tea or non-alc.

The conversation covers: the complexities of modern wine marketing; exploring strategies for engaging younger audiences; the challenges of social media, and the intricacies of managing a global content strategy. 

The episode is packed with practical advice on how to stand out in a competitive market.

Key Topics:

1. Demographics and Consumer Behaviour
2. Strategies for Connecting with Younger Audiences
3. Content Strategy for Small to Medium-Sized Wineries
4. Navigating Social Media Challenges
5. Global Content Strategy and Localization
6. Personalizing the Brand When You’re Corporate
7. Digital Engagement with Trade Partners

And if you want the takeaways, don’t forget to sign up for the Drinks Insider newsletter!

How would it change your business if you could predict how successful your products would be before you launched them? 

Or what about if you wanted to create something very risky, and someone handed you a map of all the places where it was guaranteed to sell?

Or how would your life change if you’d launched a wine that wans’t working, and someone could tell you how to fix it?

The technology to do all of this exists and it’s been developed by a California company called Tastry, founded by Katerina Axelsson.

In this episode she explains how machine learning, AI and chemistry have unlocked consumer insights that have led not just to higher sales, but also a much better understanding of who might like a particular wine, and where the best place to sell it is.

Who truly understands what people are drinking? In this episode of Drinks Insider, host Felicity Carter chats with Gary Ross, Chief Growth Officer at Union, a point-of-sale and guest ordering platform that gives new meaning to the phrase “data mining”.

There’s not much he doesn’t know about drink trends and consumer behaviour, because Union sees what’s happening in real time. From the meteoric rise of tequila to the enduring power of celebrity brands, Gary dissects the forces shaping what we drink and how we drink it.

More importantly, he explains the inner workings of the Mexican Candy Shot. You'll never look at your drinks menu the same way again.

Here are just 7 of the insights:

1. The most critical day of the week for bars and restaurants. This one day accounts for a quarter of weekly sales.
2. The peak sales window on a Saturday night and how spending patterns change.
3. Sell your customer a malt-based RTD and they will head in one drinks direction. Sell them a spirits-based RTD, and they’ll head in another.
4. Celebrity-backed brands are, on average, 73% more expensive than those without celebrity association. But do people buy them?
5. How has the moderation trend impacted sales and level of spending?
6. What IS the Green Tea Shot? Who buys it?
7. The buyers of which drink are 370% more likely to go on to order wine?

It gets you drunk, hungover and sick. And yet we go back for more. What’s the attraction of alcohol?

According to Professor Edward Slingerland, author of Drunk: How We Sipped, Stumbled, and Danced Our Way to Civilization, alcohol is the key to civilisation. In this insightful episode of Drinks Insider, he tells host Felicity Carter that much of what we think about alcohol is false.

We did not, for example, develop a taste for it because over-ripe, fermenting fruit has more calories. Nor did we value it primarily as a way of rendering dirty water safe to drink.

Instead, it’s a cultural technology that helped early humans forge larger cooperative societies, overcoming the limitations of small-group living. Without it, we’d never have learned to trust strangers.

In this episode of Drinks Insider, Prof. Slingerland discusses:

• Why the standard evolutionary “mistake” theories of alcohol are wrong
• How our thirst for beer was probably the driving force behind the development of agriculture
• Why we value alcohol as a form of social glue
• How alcohol helps drive creativity and novel thinking
• Why humans have been complaining about drinking for centuries
• How alcohol won against other intoxicants like cannabis

Professor Slingerland argues that alcohol's benefits in fostering social cohesion and creativity have been fundamental to the development of human civilisation, even if modern high-strength options present new challenges.

#DrinksInsider #Podcast #AlcoholHistory #Civilization #EdwardSlingerland #ScienceOfDrinking #SocialDrinking #Creativity #MythsBusted #FelicityCarter #DrinksPodcast

Who created the Finnish long drink? When did Finns start drinking wine? And how does wine get into their glasses?

At a time of market turbulence, when wineries are looking for new export markets, why not consider Finland? And for anybody interested, the person to talk to is Heidi Mäkinen MW, Portfolio Manager and Partner at Viinitie importing company. She’s the former Best Sommelier of Finland and a well-known WSET educator.

She talks sommeliers and Finland’s restaurant scene, why the Finns love acidity in their drinks so much, and how the wine market works. Plus, Heidi has great insights into the on-trade market generally.

Noah Sanborn Friedman, the co-founder of Top Shelf Ventures, spends his day looking for alcohol brands to invest in, and he has a lot of insights into everything from navigating the USA’s complex regulatory system to raising capital in a challenging market. In this interview, he discusses what he looks for in a brand, the importance of liquid-to-lips strategy and why he believes now is the best time to invest in alcohol. He also talks about the industry’s response to health and wellness trends and the rise of non-alc beverages.

Noah’s great combination of hard-headed financial acumen and great enthusiasm makes this a lively, insightful conversation.

Were you a brainy kid in high school? If so, science may be able to predict how much alcohol you will drink later in life. That’s a finding from Professor Sherwood Brown, a distinguished teaching Professor of Psychiatry at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center. In this wide-ranging interview, he discusses the relationship between IQ and alcohol consumption in later life, the factors that contribute to alcohol use disorder, and what’s currently known about the best way to treat alcohol use disorder. And also the surprising relationship between alcohol consumption and asthma.

But there’s also a lot we don’t know, and Dr Brown outlines the gaps, plus spills the tea on what doctors drink when they get together. It’s a great episode that answers a lot of questions about alcohol, addiction and the brain.

One of the hardest problems to solve in the non-alc category is the substitute wine. Charlie Friedmann, the president and co-founder of Proxies, was not only one of the earliest brands in the non-alcoholic drink space, but also one of the first to solve the taste problem — and do it in an artisanal way. In this episode of Drinks Insider, Charlie talks about his journey from corporate lawyer to food and wine writer to entrepreneur. He shares the story of Proxies, from its humble beginnings in a small production facility to its current status as a leading brand in the non-alcoholic beverage market. He also shares his insights on the non-alcoholic beverage market, and where he sees the opportunities for growth in the future.

What does it take to be successful in the beverage business? According to industry veteran Adam Kost, nerves of steel help. Kost, who co-founded the successful Dirty Shirley RTD, discusses his career trajectory, starting from running nightclubs in Las Vegas to marketing global brands like Heineken and Jameson. He talks about what he learned from working with major companies and how he applied those insights into creating his own start-up. He also talks about money, mission and avoiding the sunk cost fallacy trap.

Amy Troutmiller, the CEO of Really Good Boxed Wine, has reinvented boxed wine in the US market — and achieved a whopping 417% growth by focusing on quality, value, and consumer demand for moderation. 

Amy explains how she and co-founder Jake Whitman created a premium boxed wine brand and tapped into consumer desires for convenience and value, especially among older demographics.

Contrary to expectations, the core consumer base for Really Good Boxed Wine is over 55, demonstrating the demand for premium options in this demographic.

• The brand's success is largely driven by word-of-mouth marketing, highlighting the power of customer satisfaction and organic reach.
• Consumer feedback emphasises the convenience and value of boxed wine, particularly for moderation and reducing waste.
• People like the way they can have a single glass and then come back for more the next day — no wasting whole bottles!
• Strategic partnerships are everything. Without them, Really Good Boxed Wine wouldn’t have overcome the production challenges.
• Despite industry resistance, consumer demand for premium boxed wine is strong — there is significant growth potential in the category.
• The lesson is that to find success in wine, offer consumers good quality wine in a format that embraces moderation.

Listeners in the USA! If you want to try Really Good Boxed Wine for yourself, use the code DRINKSINSIDER and get 15% off.
https://reallygoodboxedwine.com

How do you launch a category-busting brand from New Zealand and storm into the US market? Lisa King can tell you, because she’s done it. A serial entrepreneur from New Zealand, King's first venture, Eat My Lunch, tackled the issue of child poverty in New Zealand with a buy-one-give-one model that provided thousands of free lunches to Kiwi kids. Her current venture, AF Drinks, is a non-alcoholic beverage company that is rapidly gaining traction in the US and Australia.

In this episode she talks about how she formulated a non-alc cocktail that experienced tasters identified as alcoholic, from how she assembled the right team and how she unlocked funding, to how she landed on retail shelves throughout the USA.

The episode covers:

• Identifying market opportunities
• Building a strong brand identity
• Adapting to consumer feedback
• The power of storytelling
• Expanding into international markets
• Overcoming funding challenges
• Building a strong team

And even how meeting Barack Obama is like meeting Santa.

Professor Tim Stockwell is the most influential figure in the world of alcohol right now. His research claiming there are no health benefits to moderate drinking has attracted wide media attention and directly led to people either moderating their alcohol intake or quitting altogether.

In fact, The New York Times has called him “one of the people most responsible for our cultural course correction on alcohol.”

The J-Curve hypothesis claims that people who drink light to moderate amounts of alcohol have lower all-cause mortality rates than those who drink heavily or not at all. Professor Stockwell challenges this hypothesis, arguing that many studies that support the J-Curve fail to account for the "sick quitter" phenomenon. This is what happens when people who have given up alcohol due to bad health are grouped with lifetime abstainers, which makes the health outcomes for moderate drinkers appear more favourable.

But his work has been harshly criticised, by both libertarians and by other scientists. He’s been accused of bias, cherry picking and sloppy referencing.

In this in-depth episode, Professor Stockwell explains his research, pushes back against his critics and explains his ties with Movendi.

This interview covers:

• Tim Stockwell’s history in the alcohol and health space
• What got him interested in the issue of moderate consumption and health
• His work challenging the J-Curve hypothesis
• The “sick quitter” phenomenon and its impact on data
• Answers to the criticisms that he cherry picks data
• A discussion of his ties to Movendi, the Swedish-based temperance group
• The impact of cancer warning labels on alcohol
• Why he wants everybody to drink less, not just problem drinkers

Relevant articles:
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/15/magazine/alcohol-health-risks.html
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/04/04/health/alcohol-health-effects.html
https://www.theguardian.com/society/article/2024/jul/27/why-scientific-support-for-alcohols-health-benefits-is-fading

Drinks Insider has also interviewed Chris Snowdon, one of Tim Stockwell's harshest critics. You'll find that here: https://open.spotify.com/episode/2k1XtETvfywIi14MYqJYtY
And here is a summary of Snowdon's criticisms: https://snowdon.substack.com/p/cherry-picking-the-evidence-on-alcohol

The first time Natalie Wang drank wine she found it ‘rancid’.

Today, Natalie is Southeast Asia’s leading voice for the wine trade. She began as a hard news journalist for outlets like the International Herald Tribune and Reuters, before moving to work with James Suckling, which opened her eyes to the world of fine wine.

In 2019 she founded Vino-Joy, a wine trade magazine based in Hong Kong, which offers business-focused coverage of the Asian wine market, addressing a major gap in the English language media. After attracting significant attention, Don St Pierre invested in the fledgling company, which is now a research house as well as a media outlet.

In this episode, Natalie explains the unique challenges and opportunities of the Chinese wine market, highlighting its significant contraction since 2020 and the shift from a gifting and banquet-driven market to one with a growing base of younger consumers interested in categories like off-dry Riesling and Sauvignon Blanc. She discusses the decline in Bordeaux sales and a rise in interest in Chinese domestic wines.

The episode further explores emerging wine markets in Southeast Asia, particularly Thailand. Altogether the conversation is a comprehensive overview of the Asian wine market from an insider’s perspective.

Morten Sørensen is the man behind ISH Spirits, a revolutionary line of non-alcoholic drinks that have taken the beverage world by storm — including listings on the Michelin-starred menus at 11 Park Madison and Alchemy. And he’s done the unthinkable, like partnering with car companies.

In this entertaining episode, Morten shares his journey from running a creative agency in Copenhagen to travelling the world as a digital nomad, to identifying a gap in the market for mindful drinking. Despite knowing absolutely nothing about beverages, he set out to create drinks that would make it easy to participate in every social occasion, with or without alcohol.

He discusses how he developed non-alc spirits that mimic the taste and experience of their alcoholic counterparts, and what it takes to get that first export order, including the need to get to the airport fast. He reveals what he’s got in his warehouse, and why knowing someone who is handy with carpentry is a must for start-ups. He also reveals how he secured those initial supermarket deals to pioneering marketing activations with car companies and music festivals.

And, finally, he reveals what it is that makes Denmark such a creative powerhouse for beverages.

Drinks Insider comes out every two weeks. If you can't wait that long between episodes, check out my other bi-weekly podcast, A Question of Drinks. My co-host Lulie Halstead and I explore a drinks question each week. Think of us as the Freakonomics of drinks.

Everybody says they want to attract a new generation of consumers to wine, but Jess Druey’s gone and done it.

In this episode of Drinks Insider she tells the unlikely story of how a college dropout launched a wine brand at 22, after Googling how to make wine. From getting her Mom to help package and send the bottles to partnership with the McBride Sisters, to taking home the $250,000 first prize on Gordon Ramsay’s Food Stars, this is one of the unlikeliest stories in wine.

But it works. Jess honed her skills at Red Bull, and she brings her relentless focus on social media and community building to Whiny Baby, along with a completely new way of looking at packaging.

If you need some inspiration, this is the episode for you. Jess shows that there’s a new consumer group out there who is not just open to wine — they’re waiting to hear more.

[2:08] Jess discusses the brand lessons she learned at Red Bull.

[5:10] The impetus for Whiny Baby and how she developed the brand.

[10:54] Early experiences, mistakes and reversals.

[14:13] Jess explains how she got her strategic partnership with the McBride sisters.

[28:58] Jess talks about her experience on Gordon Ramsay's Food Stars and that quarter of a million dollars. 

[52:07] How to build a social community who’ve got your back and will help you develop your brand.

Your Host, Felicity Carter

Based in Europe, Felicity Carter is a well-known journalist, editor and researcher. Among other roles, she is currently Editorial Director of Areni Global, the fine wine think tank headquartered in London. Previously, she was founding Executive Editor of The Drop at Pix, editorial consultant for Liv-ex, and Editor in Chief of Meininger’s Wine Business International, which she built into the world’s premier business publication, with subscribers in 38 countries. Her work has appeared in The Age and Sydney Morning Herald newspapers in Australia, and in The Guardian US, among many others. 

She was named a 2024 Industry Leader by WineBusiness Monthly.

And her other podcast is A Question of Drinks with the fabulous Lulie Halstead. It’s like the Freakonomics of Drinks. Check it out!

The wine trade is facing its worst trading conditions in 30 years — but it doesn’t have to be that way. That’s according to long-time wine industry observer and well-known journalist Jeff Siegel, who’s been immersed in the US market for going on 40 years.

This alternate title for this episode could be ‘Bitchin’ With Jeff’ as he offers his no-holds-barred take on what’s gone wrong and why.

Is there any hope? He says yes, and outlines what needs to be done to appeal to new consumers while retaining the old ones, and securing the future of wine for at least another generation.

In this episode of Drinks Insider we discuss:

[00:10:00] Premiumization, a term coined around 2010-2012. It’s the idea that Americans wanted to drink 'better' wine, leading to a focus on more expensive bottles, which increased margins for wineries, growers and retailers, but pushed out affordable options.

[00:14:09] The wine market has become very brand-focused and consumers are now brand loyal. But as the big brands become more homogenous and take up more shelf space, consumer choice is being narrowed.

[00:21:58] The restaurant industry's focus on high-priced wine to make up for costs has also hurt the industry, with many restaurants now selling poor-quality wine at high prices, with little appeal to consumers.

[00:28:21] How the wine trade can woo back entry-level wine drinkers.

[00:31:59] Despite a current grape glut, the moment for another "Two Buck Chuck" style wine is gone because the wine business has changed. 

[00:41:08] Jeff knows exactly when the temperance movement re-emerged and why.

Sounds like fun? It is! It’s a lively conversation with someone who knows what they’re talking about and who can point the way forward.

And don’t miss the next episode, with Jess Druey, founder of Whiny Baby, who is living proof that a different approach can bring a whole new audience to wine.

Prohibition didn’t begin as Prohibition. It was a bottom-up movement embraced by working people but seized on by temperance campaigners, who turned it into a disastrous social experiment that’s a byword for authoritarian overreach. Prof Dan Malleck from Brock University in Canada is a medical historian who has studied Prohibition and its fall-out and charted the rise of the contemporary neo-temperance movement.

In this special Drinks Insider episode, Dan discusses the history of the temperance movement, highlighting its moral and economic underpinnings, and compares it to the current neo-temperance movement. He critiques their selective use of research, particularly the attempt to undermine J-curve research, that associates moderate drinking with lower mortality.

This episode explores the unintended consequences of prohibitionist policies, both historically and in contemporary contexts such as Australia's tobacco control measures. The conversation does a deep dive into the question of how to balance public health concerns with individual liberty.

Want to know about trends in the US beverage alcohol market? And not just drinks trends, but how they dovetail with broader social trends? Then Bryan Roth, analyst extraordinaire, is your man.

In this episode he talks about confusion, convenience and the “invisible barrier of choice” and explains why the market is in a tailspin right now.

And did you know that carbonation is a trend? That’s right — there are people who know what they like when it comes to the tingle on the tongue, and seek exactly that sensation, and not a bubble more.

The episode also touches on the rise of flavored Canadian whiskey, the continued growth of RTDs, the shift to day drinking, and the impact of multi-generational living. Finally, we turn to the topic of cannabis.

To get more great insights from Bryan, go to https://www.sightlines.news/sign-up and type INSIDER on the signup page, for a free month of Sightlines.

It’s time to do a deep dive into wine export markets! Joris Snelten, CEO of Delta Wines, knows everything about the Netherlands—Delta Wines is not just a major wine importer and distributor that handles more than 80 million bottles, it also has a presence in Belgium, Poland, the Czech Republic, and Finland.

Joris talks about how he got into wine, and the journey of a European wine professional. He also explains how the Dutch wine market works from supermarkets and wine shops to online retailers—and reveals that Holland is moving from a beer and spirits market to a wine one.

After touring the Netherlands, the conversation moves into Belgium, Eastern Europe and the Nordic monopoly markets. 

Alba Hough isn’t just president of the Icelandic Sommelier Association and chief production officer of Himibri Gin. She’s also the coolest woman in wine.

In this wide-ranging conversation, Alb talks about her unexpected career path in wine, including her participation in international sommelier competitions. She also discusses how Iceland’s unique food and wine culture was shaped by its history, geography and tourism — and reveals a unique approach to fish preservation. And there’s plenty about what Icelanders drink and how to get in to the alcohol monopoly.

But more than that, she discusses has past as a teenage grave digger, and how Facebook helped her track down longlost family members.

There’s a wine downturn going on, and yet The Wine Group, America’s second-largest wine company, is snapping up brands like the market is expanding. Felicity Carter speaks with CEO John Sutton, who explains why he remains bullish on wine even as headlines warn of slowdown. Earlier this year, The Wine Group bought a suite of Constellation Brands labels, including Meiomi, Robert Mondavi Private Selection and Woodbridge, plus vineyards and production facilities — a deal Sutton describes as both a vote of confidence and a deliberate decision to consolidate scale.

He discusses how the company rehabilitates neglected brands, the growth of private label in the US, and why premiumisation still matters despite pressure on value wines. Sutton also outlines how portfolio segmentation works inside a business with more than 60 brands, when to divest rather than persist, and how alternative packaging such as boxed wine and single-serve formats are reshaping consumer behaviour.

The conversation ranges from Gen Z’s cross-category drinking habits to the rise of “better-for-you” low- and no-alcohol wines, and the surprising growth of very high-alcohol styles. Sutton also explains The Wine Group’s longer-term ambitions in spirits and functional beverages, while keeping the focus on wine innovation, channel expansion, and premiumisation.

And don’t forget to sign up to the Drinks Insider newsletter!

Meet your host:

Felicity Carter is an award-winning wine and drinks journalist, editor, speaker trainer and content strategist. She led Meininger’s Wine Business International to become the world’s most must-read wine trade magazine, and was founding Executive Editor of The Drop/Pix, which the Wall Street Journal named one of the most trusted sources of wine information. A regular keynote speaker at international events, she was named a 2024 Industry Leader by WineBusiness Monthly.

How did a scrappy idea born in a London garage turn into one of the world’s most recognisable oat milk brands? From the early days of KeepCup to building the first shelf-stable cold brew, Stuart shares the hard truths about entrepreneurship in food and drink — wafer-thin margins, constant reinvention, and the sheer expense of creating a new category.

Their conversation dives into the evolution of plant-based beverages, the chaotic launch into the US market during the Great Oat Milk Shortage, and the role of timing, luck, and relentless work. Stuart is candid about investor relationships, the bruising challenges of scaling internationally, and why Minor Figures doesn't just sell oak milk — it sells attitude. And also why oat milk is the perfect pairing with coffee.

Key moments:

00:52 How creating a product that fits seamlessly into existing workflows, like KeepCup’s size matching disposable cups, can drive rapid adoption.

11:28 The virtues of launching with a “minimum lovable product” rather than a minimum viable one.

12:11 How commercial failure can still attract big players if you’re solving a technical problem no one else has cracked.

21:07 In beverage distribution, you often need to create demand first so that distributors are willing to carry you.

24:08 Proving product-market fit comes before scaling local production, even if international shipping is costly.

25:52 External shocks like tariffs can create operational drama, so resilient supply chains are essential.

27:54 Winning over industry tastemakers (like roasters) can cascade into broader adoption through their networks.

34:47 Investor partners who genuinely love the product often provide more support and better terms than purely financial backers.

39:50 Growth can overwhelm back-office systems, so prepare for scaling pain long before you need it.

49:59 New categories are extremely expensive to grow, so anchoring your product in a passionate community is critical.

And don’t forget to sign up to the Drinks Insider newsletter!

Meet your host:

Felicity Carter is an award-winning wine and drinks journalist, editor, speaker trainer and content strategist. She led Meininger’s Wine Business International to become the world’s most must-read wine trade magazine, and was founding Executive Editor of The Drop/Pix, which the Wall Street Journal named one of the most trusted sources of wine information. A regular keynote speaker at international events, she was named a 2024 Industry Leader by WineBusiness Monthly.

What actually happens when the alcohol industry gets a seat at the global health table? In this episode, Julian Braithwait, the former UK ambassador to the UN and now Director General of the International Alliance for Responsible Drinking, lays out how international alcohol policy is made and contested.

From WHO mandates to temperance NGOs and the upcoming UN High-Level Meeting on NCDs, this wide-ranging discussion explores why “no safe level” is a political slogan, not a scientific consensus and what’s at stake if the global policy framework shifts away from managing harmful drinking.

Topics Covered:

• What IARD is and how it works with global institutions

• The difference between WHO Geneva and its regional offices

• What ECOSOC status actually allows industry to do

• How the alcohol sector is reforming digital marketing

• The science behind “no safe level” and why it's controversial

• Influence of Bloomberg and Gates Foundation in WHO policy

• The risk of a Framework Convention on Alcohol Control

• Illicit alcohol and emerging market risks

• How temperance groups gained formal recognition

• Why upcoming UN resolutions could change everything

And don’t forget to sign up to the Drinks Insider newsletter!

Meet your host:

Felicity Carter is an award-winning wine and drinks journalist, editor, speaker trainer and content strategist. She led Meininger’s Wine Business International to become the world’s most must-read wine trade magazine, and was founding Executive Editor of The Drop/Pix, which the Wall Street Journal named one of the most trusted sources of wine information. A regular keynote speaker at international events, she was named a 2024 Industry Leader by WineBusiness Monthly.

Allison Luvera, co-founder of Juliet, joins Drinks Insider to talk about how she  built a premium boxed wine brand in the US. She reveals how pandemic insights led to launching Eco-Magnum, how her background in fashion and at Pernod Ricard shaped strategy, and the reality of creating a new wine packaging format. Allison explains fundraising challenges, distribution hurdles, and why direct-to-consumer is vital for proof of concept. She shares lessons on hiring, influencer marketing, customer insights, and what it takes to premiumise boxed wine in a sceptical market.

00:20 Allison realised during the pandemic that boxed wine offered convenience but lacked premium quality and branding.

01:30 Seeing boxed wine as eco-friendly drove Juliet’s mission to premiumise the format for aspirational consumers.

05:12 Despite a wine marketing background, Allison had to build supply chain knowledge from scratch through her network.

06:57 Juliet created its own cylindrical Eco-Magnum packaging to stand out in retail and convey luxury.

10:52 Allison did an MBA before launching Juliet to gain operations, finance, and fundraising skills.

15:30 Their first fundraising round started with family and friends before expanding to angels and family offices.

23:16 Distributors initially resisted because they wanted proof of retail success before onboarding Juliet.

29:33 For their first hire, Juliet prioritised marketing support while founders did direct sales themselves.

33:30 DTC data revealed their customer is predominantly women under 44, including strong suburban demand.

45:53 Allison warns founders not to enter alcohol without understanding compliance, distribution, and category nuance.

And don’t forget to sign up to the Drinks Insider newsletter!

Meet your host:

Felicity Carter is an award-winning wine and drinks journalist, editor, speaker trainer and content strategist. She led Meininger’s Wine Business International to become the world’s most must-read wine trade magazine, and was founding Executive Editor of The Drop/Pix, which the Wall Street Journal named one of the most trusted sources of wine information. A regular keynote speaker at international events, she was named a 2024 Industry Leader by WineBusiness Monthly.

What happens when two friends in their twenties get fed up with syrupy energy drinks and decide to invent a caffeinated water that actually tastes like water? Orka founders Michael Moriarty and Nash Hale join Drinks Insider to talk about their journey from college roommates to beverage entrepreneurs. They reveal how they raised $355K in friends-and-family money, endured a year of catastrophic production failures, and finally cracked the code for manufacturing a clear pressurised can — just in time to ride a viral wave on Amazon.

We cover:

• The unglamorous truth about energy drink flavour fatigue
  
  
• Why beverage manufacturing is a form of hazing
  
  
• What a "seaming consultant" actually does
  
  
• How TikTok and a well-timed tweet changed everything
  
  
• The upsides and downsides of selling on Amazon
  
  
• Why they chose the name Orka and how they almost didn’t
  
  

If you’re dreaming of launching a drink brand, this is a must-listen.

• 00:05 — Intro to the Orka story and what happened when the WSJ found out
  
  
• 03:18 — “Why not just put caffeine in water?”: the founding insight
  
  
• 06:18 — They backed into health by chasing simplicity, not wellness
  
  
• 09:01 — Time to start a beverage company!
  
  
• 10:48 — The 150mg caffeine challenge and why flavour houses balked
  
  
• 12:35 — Panic attacks from over-caffeinated taste testing
  
  
• 18:04 — The transparent plastic can that nearly killed the business
  
  
• 21:08 — Every production run failed for a year. Here’s why.
  
  
• 23:24 — How close they came to shutting it all down
  
  
• 26:10 — Selling on Amazon: upsides, pitfalls, and inventory anxiety
  
  
• 30:26 — What happened a...

What kind of founder quits a high-paying tech job to launch a single-SKU wine brand in an unfamiliar package — and manages to raise $1.4 million to do it?

In this episode, Felicity talks to Daniel Rodriguez, founder of Currently Wine Co., a Sauvignon Blanc from California’s Central Coast packaged in an aluminium bottle. The packaging isn’t just a gimmick: it’s core to the bigger mission of lowering the carbon footprint of wine while supporting nearshore environmental projects, from oyster bed regeneration to coral reef restoration.

Daniel explains how he:

• Raised nearly $1 million from friends and former colleagues in a friends-and-family round

• Opened up a second round via crowdfunding to let everyday consumers invest

• Acquired the assets of ProudPour and turned them into a more focused brand

• Solved the technical nightmare of bottling wine in aluminium with a closure nobody had standardised

• Chose to launch with just one wine, in one region, despite distributor pressure to go wide

We also cover:

• Why distribution is the biggest bottleneck for new wine brands

• The branding lessons he brought over from tech (and why wine needs to catch up)

• The rigorous taste-testing process behind the wine itself—and why he scrapped several early blends

Whether you're a founder, investor, distributor, or just curious about how wine brands actually get built, this is a rare, nuts-and-bolts conversation about what it really takes to launch something new in a saturated market.

Mentioned in this episode:

• Currently Wine

• Republic (crowdfunding platform)

• Drinks Insider newsletter — it's great! Sign up now

Meet your host:

Felicity Carter is an award-winning wine and drinks journalist, editor, speaker trainer and content strategist. She led Meininger’s Wine Business International to become the world’s most must-read wine trade magazine, and was founding Executive Editor of The Drop/Pix, which the Wall Street Journal named one of the most trusted sources of wine information. A regular keynote speaker at international events, she was named a 2024 Industry Leader by WineBusiness Monthly.

Christian Miller, Research Director at the Wine Market Council and founder of Full Glass Research, joins Felicity Carter to explore changes in wine consumption. With decades of market research behind him, Christian outlines how economic, cultural, and demographic shifts are shaping the way Americans approach wine.

From the decline of traditional wine drinkers to the rise of hybrid and alternative alcohol products, the conversation covers a range of factors that are altering the market. Christian also examines the role of gender, income, and ethnicity in changing wine preferences, and discusses why some long-standing assumptions no longer hold true.

Whether you're in the wine trade or just curious about consumer behavior, this episode offers a grounded and data-driven perspective on the future of wine.

This episode covers:

1. Key reasons behind the recent decline in US wine consumption

2. Differences between generational attitudes toward wine

3. The effect of economic pressure and wellness trends on alcohol buying

4. How wine's unique position has been diluted by market competition

5. Results from category shifting and consumer behavior research

6. Emerging demographic and ethnic shifts in wine consumption

7. Gender-specific perceptions of wine among younger drinkers

8. Consumer response to packaging formats like cans and boxes

9. Prospects for wine labeling, transparency, and simplified consumer guidance

Meet your host:

Felicity Carter is an award-winning wine and drinks journalist, editor, speaker trainer and content strategist. She led Meininger’s Wine Business International to become the world’s most must-read wine trade magazine, and was founding Executive Editor of The Drop/Pix, which the Wall Street Journal named one of the most trusted sources of wine information. A regular keynote speaker, she was named a 2024 Industry Leader by WineBusiness Monthly.

How can wine businesses innovate while remaining true to tradition?

Jonathan Steyn, convener of the Wine Business Management and Hospitality Leadership program at the University of Cape Town Graduate School of Business, offers a way forward, grounded in both practical experience and academic rigour. An expert in market creation and innovation, he addresses everything from overcoming traditional mindsets to navigating global market shifts and connecting with new generations.

He gave lots of practical advice on:

• How to unlock wine innovation
• How to bust up silos and get teams to work together
• The strength of weak ties — why sector cooperation is essential
• The two faces of innovation: the incremental versus the radical
• Spotting the Blue Ocean opportunity
• Marketing to the next generation and the importance of transcendent values
• Navigating wine consumption cycles
• The importance of updating the leadership structure

and

• Innovation on a shoestring budget!

Meet your host:

Felicity Carter is an award-winning wine and drinks journalist, editor, speaker trainer and content strategist. She led Meininger’s Wine Business International to become the world’s most must-read wine trade magazine, and was founding Executive Editor of The Drop/Pix, which the Wall Street Journal named one of the most trusted sources of wine information. A regular keynote speaker, she was named a 2024 Industry Leader by WineBusiness Monthly.

Nicholas Crampton has pulled off what many in wine say can’t be done: turning a small redundancy pay out into a multi-million dollar wine juggernaut. As co-founder of Fourth Wave Wines, Nick has mastered the art of “trend-first, retail-ready” wine: spotting shifts in London, Paris or the Hamptons, adapting them to mainstream shelves, and negotiating hard with Australian retail giants like Dan Murphy’s and BWS. The result is a stable of 45 brands, including lighter, sustainable labels like Tread Softly and unapologetically full-flavoured wines like Elephant in the Room.

In this episode, Nick explains why consumer testing is overrated, why Dan Murphy’s functions as his “number one export salesman,” and how Fourth Wave uses packaging, pricing, and design to give boutique ideas mass appeal. We cover natural wine, flavoured sparkling, the rise of Bento for Asian dining, and even high-strength Shiraz under the Mullet brand. It’s a rare look at how a modern wine company thrives not through vineyard pedigree but through brand architecture, ruthless pragmatism, and a nose for what’s coming next. And it's a playbook that can be used in any market.

Meet your host:

Felicity Carter is an award-winning wine and drinks journalist, editor, speaker trainer and content strategist. She led Meininger’s Wine Business International to become the world’s most must-read wine trade magazine, and was founding Executive Editor of The Drop/Pix, which the Wall Street Journal named one of the most trusted sources of wine information. A regular keynote speaker at international events, she was named a 2024 Industry Leader by WineBusiness Monthly.

And Drinks Insider is an award-winning podcast! It has won the 67 Pall Mall Global Wine Communicator Award in Audio.

Kate Herbert used to sell cereal and pet food at General Mills and J.M. Smucker. Now she’s in wine, where the budgets are smaller, the competition is insane (110,000 SKUs in the US alone), and the glamour wears off the moment you look behind the curtain. Her first year on the job produced something unusual: Ranch Wine. It looks like an RTD, comes in at 11% ABV, and tastes like pineapple, strawberry or cherry — except it’s all grapes, no flavourings. “Flavourful, not flavoured,” as she keeps repeating, because even her own winemakers didn’t believe it at first.

The project went from idea to shelf in about five months, which is nothing in wine terms. Demos had to be staged with rocks glasses, ice, salt and tajín rims, because influencers kept pouring it into stemware. Off-aisle displays work better than the varietal wall; younger drinkers don’t even walk the aisle. The result: 50,000 cases in six months, 40% of them in places Bonterra had never been before. It’s a reminder that agility, not heritage, is what makes innovation land — and that taste still beats every sustainability claim on the shelf.

00:28 CPG to wine: what transfers and what doesn’t

02:33 Why wine is hard: 110,000 SKUs and thin resourcing

03:51 Pet-food “health halo” and what it taught Kate

06:05 Ranch water explained and the $115m signal

06:32 Thinking like a beverage brand, not a wine brand

10:25 Concept testing, packaging-first surveys, 85% non-wine appeal

11:52 Numerator/Cydex insights on Gen Z drivers

13:38 Flavour-forward yet grape-only; “flavourful, not flavoured”

19:38 Demos, influencers, and breaking the stemmed-glass reflex

28:40 From brief to shelf in ~5 months; why agility mattered

30:31 Scaling and distribution; national, ~50k cases

And don’t forget to sign up to the Drinks Insider newsletter!

Meet your host:

Felicity Carter is an award-winning wine and drinks journalist, editor, speaker trainer and content strategist. She led Meininger’s Wine Business International to become the world’s most must-read wine trade magazine, and was founding Executive Editor of The Drop/Pix, which the Wall Street Journal named one of the most trusted sources of wine information. A regular keynote speaker at international events, she was named a 2024 Industry Leader by WineBusiness Monthly.

And Drinks Insider is an award-winning podcast! It has won the 67 Pall Mall Global Wine Communicator Award in Audio.

How did US wine lose the plot — and a whole generation of new consumers?

Cory Assink and Zeke Blattler, co-founders of Los Cuernos, explain what happened and how they’re rebuilding the on-trade wine category, one consumer trial at a time.

They discuss the incentive failures of the three-tier system, why on-premise margins bred stale product and bad value, and how beer distributors outmanoeuvred wine by owning convenience and single-serve. 

They detail how they grew their accounts from 0 to more than 240. Forecast: ~15k cases this year, aiming for 50–70k next year.

And don’t forget to sign up to the Drinks Insider newsletter!

Meet your host:

Felicity Carter is an award-winning wine and drinks journalist, editor, speaker trainer and content strategist. She led Meininger’s Wine Business International to become the world’s most must-read wine trade magazine, and was founding Executive Editor of The Drop/Pix, which the Wall Street Journal named one of the most trusted sources of wine information. A regular keynote speaker at international events, she was named a 2024 Industry Leader by WineBusiness Monthly.

Celebrity partnerships in alcohol have a mixed track record. When a star is genuinely invested — creatively involved, personally passionate, publicly committed — the results can be transformative. When the celebrity is simply under contract, doing a weekly Instagram post and little else, the partnership quietly dies. So when Carlsberg announced that Robert Pattinson would become the face of 1664 Blanc, the obvious question was: which kind of partnership is this?

In this episode, Felicity Carter puts that question directly to Seva Nikolaev, Global Vice President of Premium Brands at Carlsberg. His answer is surprisingly candid. Pattinson wasn't just hired and handed a script — he was in the room (well, via Teams) from the beginning, shaping the creative direction of the campaign and bringing in his own trusted director, Brady Corbett, to helm it. Whether that level of involvement translates into the kind of authentic, enduring brand relationship that actually moves product is the big question running through this conversation.

Along the way, Nikolaev also pulls back the curtain on why 1664 Blanc is one of beer's most unusual stories — a super-premium lager that draws up to 80% of its new customers away from wine, spirits, and other categories entirely — and where he sees premium beer heading as the wider category faces mounting pressure.

Kirk French teaches one of the most popular undergraduate courses in the United States. His so-called “Booze and Culture” course at Penn State, which covers the anthropology of alcohol, attracts 700 students a time. From him, they learn how fermented beverages reveal fundamental truths about human culture. From milking horses to create traditional Mongolian airag, to excavating beer cans at football tailgates, French uses alcohol as a lens to make anthropology accessible and engaging. His research spans Maya brewing traditions, Appalachian moonshine archaeology, and the social dynamics of college drinking, all while challenging students to understand that alcohol consumption patterns expose socioeconomic status, cultural values, and the universal human desire for social connection and altered consciousness.

In this wide-ranging conversation, French explores why alcohol and agriculture co-evolved, why Native North Americans never developed fermentation traditions, and whether the current push toward abstinence represents a permanent shift or temporary reaction to pandemic-era overconsumption. He argues that America's 21-year-old drinking age removes crucial guardrails that protect young drinkers in other countries, that prohibition movements always stem from fear of what intoxicated people might do when their inhibitions drop, and that cannabis and social media are now substituting for alcohol's traditional role in lowering social anxiety. His conclusion: alcohol is too deeply woven into human culture across millennia to ever disappear, though consumption patterns will continue their historical ebb and flow.

Meet your host:

Felicity Carter is an award-winning wine and drinks journalist, editor, speaker trainer and content strategist. She led Meininger’s Wine Business International to become the world’s most must-read wine trade magazine, and was founding Executive Editor of The Drop/Pix, which the Wall Street Journal named one of the most trusted sources of wine information. A regular keynote speaker at international events, she was named a 2024 Industry Leader by WineBusiness Monthly.

And Drinks Insider is an award-winning podcast! It has won the 67 Pall Mall Global Wine Communicator Award in Audio.

Bread & Butter is a rare bright spot in a category full of nervous wine producers. Caitlin Vartain Ward explains how the brand grew by treating wine as an easy everyday choice rather than a subject people must study. We talk through the origins of the Don't Overthink It campaign, the research behind a message that sounds obvious, and why understanding consumers matters more than heritage storytelling for attracting new drinkers.

She also challenges the panic narrative with what she actually sees in the data. Bread & Butter is not watching consumers race to the bottom on price in the US and she refuses to cheapen the brand to chase volume. We dig into why the $12 to $15 tier remains a sweet spot, why Chardonnay drinkers are unusually loyal, and why distinct packaging is so important when it comes to retail.

Jefferies beverage analyst Ed Mundy unpacks why alcohol’s post-pandemic slowdown isn’t a single story but a whole world of pressure. There are the macro shocks like tariffs and foreign exchange. The health and wellness trend. The shifting social role of alcohol.

And a big question about whether the industry is doing itself any favours in its approach to marketing and innovation.

In this conversation, Ed gets specific about what’s working and what isn’t; why some of the fastest-growing US products are cheap and fun; why GLP-1 drugs show a measurable but not catastrophic drag on alcohol; and why non-alcoholic beer has cracked taste and stigma while wine and spirits are still wrestling with the physics of flavour and mouthfeel.

Meet your host:

Felicity Carter is an award-winning wine and drinks journalist, editor, speaker trainer and content strategist. She led Meininger’s Wine Business International to become the world’s most must-read wine trade magazine, and was founding Executive Editor of The Drop/Pix, which the Wall Street Journal named one of the most trusted sources of wine information. A regular keynote speaker at international events, she was named a 2024 Industry Leader by WineBusiness Monthly.

And Drinks Insider is an award-winning podcast! It has won the 67 Pall Mall Global Wine Communicator Award in Audio.

Ready to hear marketing folklore dismantled? Justin Cohen from the Ehrenberg-Bass Institute takes the myths apart, one by one. In this episode of Drinks Insider,  we talk about why mental availability wins out over awareness, how to prioritise category entry points, and why the law of double jeopardy means small brands should stop chasing “loyalty” and start recruiting light and occasional buyers. Cohen maps the mechanics of growth across wine and beyond, from media choices to where your brand physically shows up, and explains why reach beats narrow targeting when you’re trying to get from zero to one purchase.

We also get into distinctiveness versus differentiation, portfolio cohesion, and the duplication-of-purchase reality that your customers are also someone else’s customers. Cohen shows how to design tastings that encode the brand not just the occasion, how to defend against retailer private labels with consistent distinctive assets, and how to adapt when affluent Boomers age out and younger buyers refuse waiting lists.

Meet your host:

Felicity Carter is an award-winning wine and drinks journalist, editor, speaker trainer and content strategist. She led Meininger’s Wine Business International to become the world’s most must-read wine trade magazine, and was founding Executive Editor of The Drop/Pix, which the Wall Street Journal named one of the most trusted sources of wine information. A regular keynote speaker at international events, she was named a 2024 Industry Leader by WineBusiness Monthly.

And Drinks Insider is an award-winning podcast! It has won the 67 Pall Mall Global Wine Communicator Award in Audio.

What can dog food teach you about the wine market?

Heidi Scheid was walking through the supermarket in 2019 when she noticed that there was a low sugar, ‘better for you’ version of absolutely everything — including dog food.

The result of her insight is the blockbuster wine Sunny With a Chance of Flowers, which is 9% abv, zero sugar and barely any calories, but which has regularly scored 90 points.

In this lively conversation, she explains how Scheid Family Wines moved up the value chain, from being a grape supplier to a producer of private labels, and then to making its own brands. She talks about business decision-making, from when to create a brand to when to kill it, and what consumers are looking for right now. She also mounts a robust defence of the culture of wine drinking, explains the SKU-rat and goes into detail on their flowers-for-a-year sweepstakes.

You’ll come out the other side understanding what makes a successful wine business tick.

Meet your host:

Felicity Carter is an award-winning wine and drinks journalist, editor, speaker trainer and content strategist. She led Meininger’s Wine Business International to become the world’s most must-read wine trade magazine, and was founding Executive Editor of The Drop/Pix, which the Wall Street Journal named one of the most trusted sources of wine information. A regular keynote speaker at international events, she was named a 2024 Industry Leader by WineBusiness Monthly.

And Drinks Insider is an award-winning podcast! It has won the 67 Pall Mall Global Wine Communicator Award in Audio.