Drinks List 2020

Heineken 0.0 on-trade sales increase by £7.7m

By Stuart Stone

- Last updated on GMT

Rapid rise: Heineken 0.0 has enjoyed volume and value sales increases in 2019
Rapid rise: Heineken 0.0 has enjoyed volume and value sales increases in 2019

Related tags Beer Public house Alcoholic beverage

While Beck’s Blue is still the best selling low and no-alcohol beer in the UK on-trade, Heineken’s offer more than doubled both in volume and value in 2019.

According to CGA data, Beck’s Blue is still the biggest low and no-alcohol beer in Britain’s pubs after a 3.8% increase in volume and a 6.1% boost in value in 2019 – taking its total sales value to more than £20m.

However, 123% increases to both volume and value have seen second-placed Heineken 0.0 close the gap – selling £7.7m more of its alcohol-free variant in the past 12 months to take its total sales to £13.9m.

The pair are by far and away the best selling no and low-alcohol beers in British pubs, with the overall sales value of third-place pour San Miguel 0,0 reaching £2.4m in the past year after respective 27.7% and 30.9% increases to volume and value.

Rounding off the top five best-sellers are Erdinger Alcoholfrei and Bavaria 0.0 in fourth and fifth respectively with the latter breaking into this year’s Drinks List after achieving 43% increases to both volume and value – the second strongest growth of the brands making this year’s list.

Punk AF

The rise of low and no

According to The Morning Advertiser’s (MA​) Beer Report 2019​, the most dramatic growth in the on-trade beer market, according to CGA, is coming from the low and no-alcohol sector with overall on-trade sales increasing by 39% from 43,479 hectolitres in 2018 to 60,496.

There have been a raft of launches in the low-ABV beer category in the past 12 months, notably BrewDog’s low-alcohol twist on flagship beer Punk IPA, Punk AF​, and Brooklyn Brewery’s 0.4% pour arriving in the UK​.

Globally, the adoption of low and no-alcohol alternatives has taken “surprisingly little education” according to Athletic Brewing’s founder Bill Shufelt​. “The UK is right on the frontier of modern health trends and has been a leader in trends towards moderation in recent data,” he explains. “Anywhere good food and beer is enjoyed, we will have a home.

“Words like ‘sober’ and ‘teetotal’ are very outdated – people can be sober forever, a year, a week, a day or an hour. It's just outdated – people want to feel good and not be impaired sometimes.”

However, despite recent growth in the category sales of low and no-alcohol beer in the UK still lag behind figures from the continent according to Lucky Saint Founder Luke Boase, who believes UK consumers still harbour a degree of cynicism and scepticism​ towards low-ABV pours.

Best-sellers

According to MA​​’s latest Drinks List, the best-selling low and no-alcohol beers in the on-trade in 2019 were:

Brand

Volume (HL)

% +/-

Value (£m)

% +/-

Beck's Blue

20,514

3.8

20.2

6.1

Heineken 0.0

17,316

123.1

13.9

123.9

San Miguel 0,0

2,944

27.7

2.4

30.9

Erdinger Alcoholfrei

2,883

11.9

1.9

16.9

Bavaria 0.0%

2,380

43.2

1.8

43.6

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