It may be no surprise that people’s consumption habits changed during the pandemic. You may have consumed a bit more alcohol and junk food in the last year. “All locked up with no place to go” made a powerful excuse to indulge! The fact that many bars and restaurants were closed as well as other lockdown restrictions created an explosion of online alcohol sales.

Burnout and stress led to significant increases alcohol consumption in the US, which was already relatively high before the pandemic. Besides increased consumption, purchasing habits changed. 

 

According to Forbes, online retail alcohol sales jumped 234% since the start of the pandemic. ¹ 

This has led to a shift in the way traditional brands have marketed their products. 

With so many people spending more time online, social media has become an essential platform to reach customers. 

Ad spending has had to shift to digital strategies that engaged social media influencers in areas where many companies previously had little presence.

Alcohol retail stores had to quickly ramp up their online offerings and offer delivery services. Many states relaxed restrictions on stores and restaurants so that they could continue to operate. 

“Ordering a cocktail from home was not really a thing before the pandemic, but Chris Swonger, CEO of the Distilled Spirits Council, said when the virus hit, state lawmakers pivoted.

“Cocktails-to-go has been a great phenomenon. Over 33 states have adopted cocktails-to-go, and that’s been an economic lifeline for many of those establishments,” ²

Even though wine makes up the largest segment of online alcohol sales, “ready-to-drink” (RTD) offerings have come on strong. 

The US is the main market driving RTD category growth, and ready-to-drink products are set to represent 20% of US alcohol e-commerce value by 2024, compared to 5% in 2019. This would make RTDs a bigger online business than beer in the US. ³

A change of habits is not an unexpected consequence of a major event. Alcohol consumption increased after 9-11, then tapered back close to the previous norm. 

International Wine & Spirit Research now expects the total value of alcohol e-commerce across 10 global markets, including the U.S., to exceed $40 billion by 2024. That’s after the figure reached about $5.6 billion in 2020, up from around $3 billion in 2019. ⁴

The change that has happened in the last year appears to be more permanent. 

Online sales were growing slowly in the years preceding Covid. The pandemic pushed consumers, retailers, and manufacturers to embrace online and digital strategies in a suddenly accelerated way. Even long after the effects of the last year, it appears e-commerce sales of alcohol will continue to grow.

Photo credit: zan-WrueFKpTlQs-unsplash

¹ https://www.forbes.com/sites/garydrenik/2021/04/01/is-the-online-alcohol-sales-boom-here-to-stay/?sh=8ea3d255d1cc

²  https://www.marketplace.org/2021/02/12/online-alcohol-sales-rise-during-the-pandemic/

³  https://www.theiwsr.com/beverage-alcohol-ecommerce-value-grows-by-42-in-2020-to-reach-us24-billion/

⁴  https://news.crunchbase.com/news/rise-in-alcohol-e-commerce-market-fuels-buzz-for-its-future/