Survey Reveals How People Really Feel About Hard Seltzer
Walk into any store that sells alcohol these days and you'll find the usual suspects: aisles of beer, wine, whiskey, and other hard liquor. You'll also find an aisle — or at least a few shelves — of hard seltzer. There are now countless brands of the fizzy alcoholic beverage, with the biggest and most popular names being White Claw and Truly. Even major beer brands like Budweiser and Corona and Costco's in-house band Kirkland have gotten in on the trend. According to IWSR, Americans bought more hard seltzer per volume than vodka in 2019 and 55% of American alcohol consumers drink hard seltzer at least once a week.
But as popular as hard seltzer appears to be on social media, at liquor stores, and at bars, how do people really feel about it? Mashed polled over 40,000 people worldwide via YouTube on whether or not they actually like the trendy new canned drink. Here's what the overwhelming majority agree on.
3 in 4 people don't actually like hard seltzer
You'd think that because there are so many flavors and varieties of hard seltzer, there would be something out there for everyone, right? Wrong. According to Mashed's poll results, just because the hard seltzer market is valued at over one billion dollars, doesn't mean that people actually enjoy drinking the carbonated beverage.
Of the 40,000-plus respondents, some 75% of them said no, they're not a fan of hard seltzer. The top-rated comment seems to sum up how the majority of people feel about the colorful cans: "Hard seltzers taste like alcoholic drinks for people who want to get drunk, but don't really like drinking." Others say they'll drink it if it's the last thing left in the cooler, but they don't love it.
However, the 25% of people who do like hard seltzer credit the beverage for being a light and refreshing choice, especially compared to beer. As another commenter simply put, "It gets the job done."