Volume sales of alcoholic drinks fell in the US in 2024, though sales grew in current value terms during the year. The final year of the review period saw alcoholic drinks continue to suffer from a decline in per capita consumption. Even as alcoholic drinks price rises and general inflation slowed from the previous year, consumers remained bearish in their purchasing habits. Save for a modest return to volume growth for RTDs after hard seltzer’s losses normalised, all other topline categories saw a decline in consumption. While much is made of this decline being attributable to mindful consumption and a shifting generational interest in alcoholic drinks, the inability of new non alcoholic analogues or soft drink volumes to account for a substitution pattern draws a throughline to the persistence of the cost-of-living crisis. This hesitancy in exploration and splurging drove many of the same category themes of 2023 into 2024. Imported, particularly Mexican, and non alcoholic brands continued to gain share in beer while mid-priced lager and craft struggled. Even as the boycott-induced losses of the Bud Light brand tapered, competition from other domestic offerings from the Molson Coors and Pabst portfolios failed to supplant the category’s total losses. Tequila (and mezcal) remained the bright spot for spirits sales while brandy and cognac plummeted further as modes of luxuriation shifted. Finally, cider and wine, even with their fiercest advocates arguing for their relevancy, variety, and untapped opportunities, held onto successes at the small and regional scale while sales at large contracted.
Beer remained the largest category within alcoholic drinks overall in 2024. The category’s steady loss of volume share looks to have steadied in recent years, with the dynamic looking even less concerning to many manufacturers given the success of beer-adjacent categories in the RTDs space. In contrast to the clean, muted flavour of domestic lager that has dominated consumption for decades, flavour-centric vehicles of convenience have come into vogue by evoking profiles akin to soft drink trends or outright extending brands from the carbonates space. While the wine category, progenitor of the original RTDs brand in Bartles & Jaymes, has struggled to maintain its relevance by modernising in the name of volume share, malt-based RTDs and hard seltzers have emphatically embraced the potential for occasion. Traditional beer may hold future opportunities given the cycle of consumer tastes, especially as Diageo’s Guinness reclaims momentum in the US on-trade culture, but for now the fight comes down to advocating for the category’s share of spend.
Anheuser-Busch InBev NV (AB InBev) was the leading company within alcoholic drinks overall in 2024. The dramatic loss of share that AB InBev experienced in 2023 normalised in 2024, with its wide portfolio and necessary pivot towards premiumisation girding it against further attrition in a difficult market. This shift towards a renewed focus on its core brands has extended into growth segments such as non alcoholic beer, where its Michelob Ultra brand, which is already marketed as low in calories and carbohydrates, finally found a place in its 0.0 offering in January 2025. The company has also embraced beverage premiumisation in the spirit-based RTD space with its Beyond Beer catalogue and, in particular, its NÜTRL suite of vodka seltzers. If the trajectory of US alcoholic drinks success is pivoting from volume dominance to value share, AB InBev is intent on navigating that dynamic.
Food/drink/tobacco specialists was the leading distribution channel within alcoholic drinks overall in 2024. Legislative restrictions on channel access for alcoholic drinks continue to favour speciality and liquor stores, particularly given the high relative unit price of spirits and more restrictive controls on where the category can be sold. However, the channel’s position has weakened slightly in recent years due to competition from modern grocery, in which small headway has been made as consumers target convenience and the reduction of shopping occasions in a perceived state of time debt. There has also been slight attrition of share from discounters as more consumers look to stretch their spending due to the prolonged cost-of-living crisis.
It was another rough year for alcoholic drinks away-from-home as both volumes and value receded in 2024, with consumers still grappling with the cost-of-living crisis and shifting their purchase priorities. An increase in the perceived value of wellness-aligned and experiential occasions came at the expense of food and beverage spending in the on-trade. Transactions at restaurants and bars remained well below their 2019 numbers, and many outlets struggled to pivot in light of increased input costs. The forecast for sales remains similarly dour, as economic uncertainty due to tariffs and a disrupted supply chain will similarly threaten discretionary spending and prices.
Volume sales of alcoholic drinks are expected to stagnate over the forecast period. While much talk late in 2024 was about the growing likelihood of consolidation as inflation cooled, the impact of trade wars and the dismantling of environmental regulations have softened any such optimism. The polarisation of consumption patterns will see an increasing divide, with the increasing erosion of the middle class likely to push buyers into the premium or economy segments. Prominent marketing themes have emerged for each of these segments, respectively embracing relaxation and escape, and nativist protectionism and nostalgia. As-domestic-as-possible sourcing and production is becoming a necessity in the US in the face of exorbitant fuel costs and import taxation. Meanwhile, a continuous reformulation strategy is becoming necessary to preserve quality, as securing everything from sweetener to caffeination to carbonation becomes tenuous. Small craft categories in the spirits, wine, and RTDs category have the potential to prosper by embracing this calamity through local sourcing and sustainability.
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Alcoholic Drinks
Alcoholic drinks is the aggregation of beer, wine, spirits, cider/perry and RTDs.
See all of our definitionsThis report originates from Passport, our Alcoholic Drinks research and analysis database.
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