How Brands Can Adapt to New Generations of Alcohol Drinkers
Chris Maffeo (0:10)
Uh so this is me. My experience and my background are in the beer business. As Emmet said, I lived in seven countries, I work in 30 markets because I was mainly working for export departments, so usually when brands are famous in the homeland but not so famous in other countries. I try to bring today a different angle to the discussion that we’ve been having until now; it’s about the life journey of a brand. So how do we incorporate the generations as the brand grows? Because brands are starting today, or they started 10 years, 20 years ago, and they go on, and every time there is new generations coming in the game. So we like to think that there are overnight successes when we see a brand and then we see it everywhere all of a sudden, and it’s just because we were not paying attention. But actually, it took 20 years on average. In these 20 years, you know, I’m talking about brands like Aperol, about Jameson, about Hendrick’s Gin, all these brands that we see now everywhere in bars and restaurants, and we think that they’ve always been there. They haven’t. Like the Negroni is an example of that, you know. Like everybody has Negroni Week now, but I remember the days where I was one of the few people—I’m a Negroni drinker—and I was one of the few people ordering, and sometimes I had to explain to the bars how to do a Negroni, and that was quite funny. So it’s usually a generation during this 20 years. So 20 years, when we look at the graph from Charlie, you know, every generation is roughly 20 years. And during this time, there’s many players entering the game, you know. There’s new generation coming in, and there’s a lot of things that happened during these 20 years. So you build a brand and you create it, you have some ideas, and then you start to see change happening. So market conditions are changing, and then you start thinking like, “Let’s blame someone, because I don’t want to blame myself.” So let’s try to see what didn’t work, and probably these new people don’t get it, or the original consumers don’t get it. “Let me change something.” But what actually happens is that during this time, there is people leaving the company. If it’s a founder-led company or if it’s a big brand, there’s new people, brand managers are leaving, they’re getting promoted, they are going from sales to marketing, marketing to commercial MD, CEOs, and so on. So some managers are leaving, some new managers are coming, and then of course there’s some knowledge that gets lost about what was the brand about—so what was the brand essence, the brand core, however we want to call it. New managers come in and they of course want to leave a mark. So the easy one is, “Let’s change packaging, let’s change communication. This doesn’t work, that’s why our sales are declining, we need to change something. You know, let’s change the communication, let’s change what we’re doing.” And then there’s new consumers and customers entering the LDA, or legal drinking age—so let’s call it 18 here, for the US it’s 21, and any other countries have got different ones, but roughly let me call it 18. So what happens is that usually who turns 18 are people that are working in the bar, so many of you probably are working in bars, bartenders, many are just consumers, so they are not trade people.
Chris Maffeo (3:41)
And what happens during this journey, during these generations? You know, generations come in—so I’ve put the year where a generation is turning 18, so 1983 is when Gen X turned 18, ’99 for Millennials, 2014 for Gen Z. The line that I’ve created, of course it’s a dummy line, but it’s how you are changing what you’re doing. So when you are not consistent to the brand essence of your brand, and you start to jump on trends—and then it could be digital, it could be different trends that are coming and going—and you go up and down on this, and you are not consistent with your brand. And then what happens when this happens, so when you are inconsistent? You know, you start chasing, you know, new generations instead of really stopping and analyzing, “Okay, what is it that doesn’t work? You know, like is it something that we’re doing?” You know, there are also like cycles. I mean, there’s the rum years, then the agave years, the gin years, and so on. You know, like sometimes you just have to wait, you know, for the wave to pick up again, instead of changing and trying to do a, you know, rum and tonic because gin and tonic is popular. So what happens is that when you’re starting to change stuff, then you are losing the existing consumer. So I was a consumer of this brand that resonated with me massively, and now all of a sudden I start to see all weird communication, weird serves. It doesn’t talk to me anymore, so I stop drinking and I look for another alternative. Or it starts discounting, and then my buying power is higher, and actually I want to premiumize, and then I discard that brand. Or then the new consumer that I’m trying to approach, actually they don’t understand what this brand is about, because, “I remember my father was drinking this brand, but it was totally different. Now what are they trying to do? You know, this sounds fake because this is not their brand core.” So they also don’t drink it. So you’re trying to catch, you know, two fishes, and you actually end up with none. And then, you know, the issue is that you actually stopped talking about the core of the brand, and this is what actually happened.
Chris Maffeo (6:00)
So what should happen instead is that you should keep the consistency very high. And the line is not straight for a reason, because of course, like, with time there are some ups and downs, some marginal changes, some evolution of the brand. Of course you cannot keep the brand exactly the same as 20 years, 40 years, 60 years ago. There will be some changes, but it’s important to try to keep it as relevant as possible for the original core of the brand. One of the most common mistakes that I’ve seen during my career is that when a brand does it well in the beginning, then at some point they stop focusing on the basics and they start to do like the fancy stuff. So these two lines are basically: the light blue line is the basics, so ritual, you know, the serve, the perfect serve, like we saw it on Guinness and Charlie’s presentation, you know, all the things that need to be consistent and then you take for granted. But if you think about it, you know, you take it for granted because you know it, because you’ve been there and somebody had taught you 10 years ago or 20 years ago. And I always give this example: a ritual, a new brand, you know, I at my age I’ve seen it already, but a new person that is 20 today may have never heard about this ritual or this—like it could be a garnish, it could be a perfect serve, it could be a beer pour, it could be anything—and they’ve never heard about it. So because when you enter, imagine like we all enter here Bar Convent, you know, there are gates at the door. You know, every time, you know, you basically have to be on the gate and wait for the people coming in, and you need to talk to those people and you need to bring them with you on the journey. And it will not be for everyone, because not everyone will resonate with your brand, but you have to pick the right ones that are right for your occasion and for your target. And the most common mistake is that they stop doing the light blue line and they go just on the high blue line, and they just start to do crazy things and fancy things, and then they forget about it. Then they have to go back to the basics.
Chris Maffeo (8:22)
So I brought some examples of brands that, according to me and to my studies, are brands that actually do it right and have done it right, and that’s why they are famous, you know, they are famous for and we know them for. I mean, imagine Campari. Campari, I remember for the last decades, you know, they’ve been talking about the Negroni, about the fact that there’s no Negroni without Campari, that there’s no Americano without Campari in those years when Negroni—I mean, very few people were drinking Negroni—but they stuck to it. They didn’t jump on another trend or another cocktail just because nobody was drinking Negroni, and then they created, you know, the wave. Look at the Negroni Week, for example. Aperol, Aperol is a typical example. Everybody talks about Aperol, but I’m Italian, I didn’t grow up with Aperol, you know. Like Aperol is a recent phenomenon of the last 20 years, you know, and they don’t stop talking about the serve, the 3-2-1, you know, they keep on talking about it because that’s important for the core of the brand. Then you do all the communication, the lifestyle, the Italian lifestyle and so on, but actually, you know, you really, really reinforce that. Take Hendrick’s as an example, you know, the cucumber with the serve on gin and tonic. You don’t stop talking about it, the cucumber, even though everybody knows it. Don’t take it for granted that everybody knows, because it’s not true, you know. Like the new people don’t know it, people that were not drinking gin don’t know it, and you need to communicate it. And then on top of that, you can do crazy activations like great activations like this one that we’re seeing here at Bar Convent. And Guinness, Charlie had a great slide on that one, you know. It’s the typical thing about adjusting the way you convey the message, but the basic of the message is the same: it’s the perfectly poured Guinness in an Irish pub or wherever that is, but it’s perfectly poured as a Guinness, and then you build some communication that is resonating with Generation Z. You know, they didn’t jump on the IPA trend when IPA was hot and nobody was drinking stout, you know. They stuck to the stout because that’s what they do.
Chris Maffeo (10:31)
So what is the key takeout here? The four main messages that I would like you to bring home with you is:
- Be consistent with your brand essence regardless, you know, adjust it very slightly with time, but keep it consistent with what you have been doing.
- Keep mastering the basics. Don’t forget about the basics even if your brand is selling millions of cases, you know. Stick to the basics, because the basics are what made your brand famous in the first place.
- Don’t change your brand essence, you know, like don’t change the actual message, change the way you convey the message. You know, imagine if you are talking—if you’re a history teacher, you know, you don’t change history because there is a different audience. Of course, if I’m talking about the Egyptians to my daughter, I explain it in a funnier way, but actually I’m still talking about the Egyptians as a history subject, right?
- And then educate new generations about your brand essence. So stick to it, stay consistent, and then everybody that will come into the generation, if you are consistent regardless of the generation you’re talking to, they will get the brand.
And I always bring the example of, you know, football. If you take a national team winning the World Cup, you know, these are the teams that are consistently investing on youth talents. You know, national teams, they cannot buy players, you know. It’s about the nationality, so you cannot just like go to another country and buy players, you know. You need to invest in the team, in the academy of the team, and then consistently you will get the results after 20 years if you start today. But if you started 20 years ago, you see the results today and then you win the World Cup. So, and the teams that can manage to do it constantly are the ones that consistently win the European League, the World Cup, and so on. So stick to the basics, be consistent, and this is what, you know, brands are supposed to be doing to accommodate, you know, new generations coming in the game. That’s all. That’s all for today. You’ll find my podcast—I have a podcast, you’ll see it here as the logo is on Spotify and Apple Podcasts—and feel free to follow me also on LinkedIn and Instagram. So thank you.
How Gen Z Feels About Alcohol According to Nielsen Data
Charlie Mitchell (0:09)
Hey everyone, nice to be here. Thanks for coming. I imagine there are a few sore heads, so I’ll try and go quick, keep this punchy, and let’s get through it. Along with Morten and Chris, we’ll be talking about Gen Z and how to attract this consumer group, as well as breaking a few myths around who this consumer actually is. Starting at a macro level, I’ve called this “The Future On-Premise Consumer,” but looking at the data, they are actually the current on-premise consumer that you need to be attracting right now. Gen Z refers to those born from 1997 to 2012. While stereotypes portray them as ethically conscious, perpetually on TikTok, and non-drinkers, we want to look at how they actually behave in the on-premise.
Charlie Mitchell (1:50)
Looking at the data, we can demystify this group: they are alcohol drinkers. In fact, 70% of them visit the on-premise weekly, which is more frequent than average. They look for sustainable, ethical businesses and enjoy experimenting with different drinks in the on-trade that they wouldn’t have at home. They aren’t loyal to specific drinks brands yet, but social media heavily impacts their choices—favoring TikTok and Instagram over Facebook. In terms of their repertoire, they hold about 4 to 5 drink categories, which is slightly lower than Millennials. Crucially, for the very first time in any consumer generation, Gen Z is more likely to drink cocktails than beer when visiting the on-trade. Beer has a recruitment problem with Gen Z because it struggles to deliver social-media-friendly serves and the “treat” experience they seek.
Charlie Mitchell (4:03)
Gen Z consumers are moderators—they drink cocktails, spirits, soft drinks, and no/low-alcohol options, while actively exploring alternative categories like Pisco, Mezcal, and craft spirits. Celebrity-endorsed drinks also perform strongly with them. One beer brand that bucked the trend and successfully attracted Gen Z is Guinness. It’s instantly recognizable, well-marketed, and highly “Instagram-friendly.” Social media holds immense power over this group: 83% make a purchase after seeing a product on social media, and over 58% buy based on influencer or celebrity endorsements. The path to purchase now happens days before a weekend visit, as consumers scroll social media on Tuesday to build inspiration for what they will order.
Charlie Mitchell (7:33)
To target Gen Z, brands must align with their interests in health, travel, and gaming. Major players like Diageo and Pernod Ricard are innovating around moderation (“slow drinking”) and lower-ABV products. In Brazil, Heineken activated at Esports events using Heineken 0.0 to build equity with young consumers living their best lives. We also see opportunities with the “digital nomad” community—such as state-funded Nomad X hubs in Brazil that place food and drink at the center of their co-living offers. Furthermore, social media trends now move globally in all directions. Africa has become a major cultural hub influencing Gen Z through Afrobeats, fashion, and film; by 2030, nearly half the global youth population will be in Sub-Saharan Africa.
Charlie Mitchell (11:25)
Global cultural influences like K-Pop and Latin American arts are heavily dictating Gen Z’s drinks decisions. Following Netflix’s investment in Korean content, spirits like Soju are adopting traditional brand-building playbooks by hiring top bartenders and activating at music festivals. Similarly, Latin American influences have propelled Tequila past Vodka to become the second-largest spirits category in the U.S. on-trade. When deciding where to go, Gen Z prioritizes drink-led and food-led occasions, but experience-led occasions are rising fastest. Rather than partying every night, they choose one or two major events a month to go big on and share on social media for “social currency.”
Charlie Mitchell (15:16)
Experience-led venues—like interactive darts, mini-golf bars, escape room bars, pop-up street food markets, and music festivals—are winning over traditional brick-and-mortar spaces with Gen Z. Operators should consider activating at these experiential venues to drive traffic back to their primary establishments. In summary, Gen Z is not a future consumer—they are today’s active consumer. Driven by social currency, unique experiences, ethical responsibility, and global culture, they may be fickle now, but brands that understand their motivations and activate effectively will build lifelong customer relationships.
