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Mallett said: “Hard seltzers are an exciting addition to the GB market. Although it is still early days, the growth seen in the US suggests a positive future for the category in GB and should further boost the growth of the strongly performing RTD category.” The London-based brand refers to the spike in popularity that the hard seltzer category has seen in the US over the past few years and aims to catalyse the trend in the UK. In the on-trade, the report noted that venues should consider giving at least two spaces in fridges to hard seltzers. The report said hard seltzer consumers are more likely to visit on-trade venues, have more disposable income and are willing to spend more on high-quality products.
Tom Mallett, consumer insights director, alcohol at Kantar, said: “Although it is still early days, the growth seen in the US suggests a positive future for the category in GB [Great Britain] and should further boost the growth of the strongly performing RTD category. It also includes commentary and predictions from industry and category experts, including Waitrose buyer John Vine, consumer insights director alcohol at Kantar Worldpanel Tom Mallett, and CGA Strategy’s Tom Mulcauley. Commenting on the launch, co-founder of Drty Matija Pisk, said: “We wanted to give UK consumers an alternative to high-sugar ciders and calorie-dense beers. Ultimately drinking alcohol is not a healthy activity, so the concept for the brand was born out of this contradiction – a drink that is clean but is still pretty Drty”. Kantar data cited by the report also found that more than 1.5m litres of hard seltzer were sold in the UK in the 12 months to 20 November 2020. Since January 2020, the category’s volume grew by 1,087% to 1.57m litres. The report said that the IWSR predicts a UK compound annual growth rate of 71% from 2019 to 2024. The proposed offer for Darty significantly undervalues the group. The structure of the proposed offer does not deliver fair value to all shareholders. It also precludes Darty shareholders from benefiting in line with Fnac shareholders any future cost or revenue synergies. We see a higher price, a full or partial cash alternative and even possibly a dual London listing as some of the remedies for us to alter our view that this deal is not in the interests of all shareholdersRaspberry Rosé offers a sweet and fruity beverage, meanwhile, White Citrus features hints of grapefruit and lime. Fnac is cash rich, c.€540m (Dec 2014) and with little commitment to a dividend policy we question why there is no cash component to the proposed offer. The attraction of Fnac paper, a very different business to Darty, is questionable for Darty shareholders in our view. Darty management has delivered against all its stated objectives, is high quality and has support from a high quality shareholder base. The underlying valuation for the Group and now the proposed offer of 101p, do not reflect these strengths, its strong cash flow profile or the future profit potential for Darty. The report was compiled and authored by Matthew Langley, who is a food and drink insights, strategy and brand expert with more than 19 years’ experience. He previously authored the first four editions of the Weston’s category report, the annual analysis on the cider category.
New beverage brand Drty has launched a 4% ABV ‘zero-carb’ hard seltzer in two flavours, as it looks to bring the drinks trend to the UK. Looking forward, Clements believes people are buying into seltzers and he says Drty was the number one or two selling product at several festivals this year, “outselling even lager at Mighty Hoopla Festival”.In addition to supporting category growth, the emergence of hard seltzers should help to further alter perceptions of RTD in the same way that premix products (such as canned gin and tonic) have done so successfully over the past few years. The revamp would seek to capitalise on RTD category growth, while disassociating from the term “hard seltzer”, Drty said. According to Google Trends data, the top five trending countries for the category are the US, Norway, Ireland, Canada and the UK. London-based hard seltzer brand Drty released The Drty Hard Seltzer Handbook, which looks at the origin of the category, other brands in the market, consumer demographics, case studies, market size and future predictions. And as part of the brand shake-up, he also says Drty’s White Citrus has been rebadged to Lime Crush, “which is much easier to understand”.
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