After a night of drinking beer and playing music together, a friend took a closer look at his beer can and exclaimed; “Guys, we’ve been drinking alcohol-free beer!” Everyone laughed, and couldn’t believe no one had noticed. He mentioned that much to his own surprise he had really enjoyed the “beer” but would never have intentionally bought alcohol-free beer as he’d never previously tasted one that he liked.
This story highlights a few pertinent issues within the non and low alcoholic drinks market; that design is important to ensure initial purchase and secondly, taste is critical to secure repeat purchase. However, the balancing act that non and low alcoholic drinks producers need to strike is far more complex than this anecdote portrays.