Boston Beer Co. Dives into Hard Seltzer
Truly Spiked & Sparkling. / Image provided
It’s shaping up to be the summer of boozy seltzer.
On the heels of Wachusett Brewing Company’s Nauti Seltzer release last month, Boston Beer Co. has announced a clear contender has joined its beverage portfolio: Truly Spiked & Sparkling is now available in three fruity flavors. Brewbound noticed the new product on Friday.
Truly Spiked is a cane sugar-based alcohol, so it’s gluten-free. Each 12-ounce bottle logs 100 calories and 2 grams of carbs. The 5 percent ABV sippers are naturally flavored with Colima lime, a citrus from Mexico’s Pacific coast; grapefruit and its sweet cousin, pomelo; and pomegranate.
Boston Beer Co. also produces Samuel Adams beers, Angry Orchard hard cider, and Twisted Tea hard iced teas. Casey O’Neill, a product developer at Boston Beer, created the company’s sparkler. “A few years ago, I began noticing many of my friends and family members giving up traditional soda for flavored sparkling water,” she said, via a press release. “I started playing around with alcoholic versions as a side project over a year ago, realizing there was a need for something clean, crisp and sparkling, like traditional sparkling water, but for times when you want to imbibe.”
Boston Beer Co. founder Jim Koch was candid with BostInno earlier this year about competition in the craft beer world, and this new product gives them access to what will likely prove to be an untapped share of consumers. In Brewbound, Scott Adams of Burke Distributing said, “We are going to seek alternative drinkers and those drinkers don’t necessarily live in the beer aisle.”
Truly Spiked & Sparkling is packaged in six-pack bottles and is available in 20 U.S. markets, including throughout New England.
In addition to the Massachusetts beer companies that have got in on low-calorie boozy bubbles, Connecticut-based SpikedSeltzer brought a 6 percent ABV, gluten-free product to shelves in 2013. This season, SpikedSeltzer’s four flavors are available in six-packs of slim, 12-ounce cans, in addition to the mixed 12-pack cans and bottled six-packs it has previously offered.
The hard seltzer trend is floating on the bubbles of nonalcoholic carbonated water sales, which have steadily increased over the past decade, according to various industry reports. But just remember, when you’re on the beach this summer: Hard seltzer may be refreshing like its carbonated cousin, but it’s still booze. Bring some regular hydration along, too. That goes for you as well, traditional beer consumers.
Truly Spiked & Sparkling, MSRP $9.99-10.99, trulyspikedsparkling.com.
