• 🍸 Pronghorn Invests in Mocktail Club
• 🥥 Strange Water’s Strategy To Create Coconut Water Converts
• 🍸 Quarter Proof Is “Reengineering Spirits” 
• 🥃 A Drink With… Missy Spears, Organizer of New Queer Bourbon Week, Bourbon & Belonging
• 🍊 Alico Lines Up New Agreement With Tropicana

Non-alcoholic canned cocktail brand Mocktail Club has brought in an undisclosed amount in funding from spirits capital and brand building firm Pronghorn, the company announced today.

🐂 Mocktail Club is Pronghorn’s first investment in the explosive NA space. The platform focuses on supporting Black-owned spirits and alcohol brands and its portfolio includes companies such as Hella Cocktail Co., Abisola Whiskey and Los Hermanos Tequila, among others.

🔥 Mocktail Club’s line of sparkling drinks aim to provide more complex flavor profiles to the NA adult beverage occasion, and rather than simply replicate classic cocktails without the spirits, the portfolio features original flavors like Manhattan Berry, Bombay Fire, Capri Spritz and Havana Twist.

🚚 The brand is now looking to expand its distribution. Currently sold in around 1,200 doors – primarily in the Mid-Atlantic and California – CEO Pauline Idogho is aiming to further extend Mocktail Club’s reach nationwide.

Read the full story on BevNET. Want to learn more about Mocktail Club’s trajectory? Register for BevNET Live (happening this week in NYC) and hear directly from Pauline yourself. 

There’s a new New York City-based coconut water brand on the market and it isn’t looking to build through the typical channels. Strange Water launched last week via a partnership between live events company Stranger Than and promoter TCE Presents and is looking to build brand awareness through its own in-house platform.

✨ The brand sells two SKUs – still and sparkling – of coconut water sourced in Vietnam and sold in 11.2 oz. cans. The products are sold at all events put on by Stranger Than, including music festivals, parties and cultural events in addition to about 200 doors between NYC and LA. 

🎤 The events business has served as more than just a brand launchpad. The team has been integral in building both the Strange Water brand identity and getting it out the door and onto shelves.

💬 “Our main focus is how to sell as many [coconut waters] as we can in the events and how to get as much exposure there. The interest is high for us to push it in the right way,” said founder Tal Ohana. 

BevNET Insiders can read the full story to learn how this events company is building inside the beverage business.

Is cocktail culture moving into its technicolor era? British liquor brand Quarter Proof is hitting the U.S. market this month in an attempt to offer a “third way” to drinking by offering lower ABV spirits for cocktail drinkers who still like booze just want to have less of it. 

✨ Founded in 2021 by Fabian Clark and Rohan Radhakrishnan, the brand makes three varieties of 15% ABV liquors: vodka (Three Grain Spirit), tequila (Blanco Agave Spirit) and gin (London Dry Spirit).

🆕 Initially, the brand was called Quarter but was forced to rebrand itself to meet U.K. regulator labeling standards. The over six month process of renaming itself and its products is being seen as a blessing and positive evolution as the brand explores new markets.

😬 Tapping into low-ABV options could be a smart choice considering the category is still relatively untapped with only a few brands (we see you BODY, Sommaroy and KEEL) operating in it currently. 

👀 As the numbers keep reminding us, alcohol moderation trends aren’t driving consumers towards total abstinence. According to the Adult Non-Alcoholic Beverage Association about 94% of non-alc buyers are also purchasing full-strength options, and non-alcoholic spirits continue to grow in the U.S. where dollar sales were up 85% compared to the same period last year, according to recent NielsenIQ data.

Read the full story on BevNET.

A new event is putting the spotlight on including the LGBTQ+ community in Kentucky’s largest industry, bourbon. 

The first Queer bourbon week, Bourbon & Belonging, was announced this spring and, come October, aims to show a side of bourbon country that isn’t often portrayed. 

We chatted with the executive director of Queer Kentucky, which is leading the organization of the event about how it is helping to stake a claim in bourbon culture, what support from major Kentucky brands means in a state with increasing anti-LGBTQ+ legislation and how bourbon can counter its cis-male image. 

Read the full story on BevNET.

Alico, one of the largest citrus producers in the U.S., has lined up a new deal with one of biggest juice brands, Tropicana, extending the two companies’ previous agreements to July 2027. 

🌴 The agreement will bring about 65% of Alico’s planted citrus orchards to Tropicana at prices per pound solids that are “approximately 33% to 50% higher over the term of the contract than the average price for all the citrus fruit sold to Tropicana last season.”

🧑‍🌾 Florida citrus fruit growers have dealt with on-going yield challenges and pricing has gone up as a result of citrus greening and the impacts of severe weather. Some juice brands like Uncle Matt’s have moved portions of their operations to other locales as a result.

🔊 “[Alico and Tropicana] are both committed to meeting the challenges facing the Florida citrus industry together with near-term patience and long-term focus” in an agreement that solidifies the supply chain “at more certain pricing provisions over the next several seasons,” Alico president and CEO John Kiernan said in a statement.

📈 As a whole, the refrigerated juice category posted dollar sales of $3.2 billion in the last 52-week period ending April 21, down 4.4% year-over-year, according to Circana omnichannel tracking. Tropicana represents about 30% of the market, with dollar sales up 1% with unit sales down 2.3% during the period.