Brewery and taproom products: cider, seltzer and NA

What to take away

Why the non-beer end of the list matters

A guest who does not drink beer can decide where the whole group goes. The option decides whether a whole group comes in, and a taproom with nothing for that guest sends the group down the street.

A lager or a hazy IPA brings the beer drinker. A cider, a seltzer and one NA option bring everyone else. Those three slots ask for little brewing work, because each can be bought in and poured or sold from the cooler.

The slots still cost bar time and shelf space, so they need the same test as every beer. The measure is contribution per bar minute: take what the item earns after its cost, divide by the seconds it takes to serve, and compare across slots.

An example group of four

Picture four friends at one table. Two order a lager and a hazy IPA. One wants a cider. The fourth is driving and wants an NA can. With all three slots on the list, all four orders land at your bar.

Without the NA can, the driver asks for water, and the next round may happen somewhere else. A group like this is an example, not a statistic. It shows why a single-item row understates these slots: the cider and the NA can sit beside two draft sales rather than replacing them.

Cider, on draft or in cans

Cider brings in guests who do not drink beer. Downeast Cider, unfiltered and made in East Boston, Massachusetts, and Angry Orchard Crisp Apple (5% ABV, Boston Beer Company) show what the slot looks like in practice.

Guest cider from a regional producer is often cheaper to stock than brewing your own, which makes it the easiest of the three slots to add. A cider handle also changes how the beers around it are scheduled, and the tank logic behind that choice sits in the products and packages guide.

Treat a guest cider as a service to guests rather than a profit center, because its margin is thinner than your own beer. Draft or can is a bar-time decision. A cider on draft is poured like a beer. A can is handed over, so it takes less of the crew's attention in a rush.

Hard seltzer, bought in or made

White Claw (Mark Anthony Brands, 5% ABV) and Truly (Boston Beer Company) are the brands most taprooms keep in the cooler. Singles typically sell for $3 to $4, and 12-packs run $18 to $22 at retail. Treat those as typical ranges, not quotes.

Buying seltzer keeps handling cost low. Making it keeps production cost low. Either way it gives the group member who came along for somebody else something to drink, without asking the bar to build a drink.

Making it adds a rules question. TTB's hard seltzer presentation says that products sold as hard seltzer are frequently classified as beer rather than wine or distilled spirits. A seltzer you brew belongs in the licensing conversation before it belongs on the list.

Non-alcoholic beer and hop water

Athletic Brewing Run Wild IPA comes in six-packs that typically sell for $10 to $12. Guinness 0.0 and Heineken 0.0 sit on the same shelf, and Lagunitas Hoppy Refresher and Sierra Nevada Hop Splash cover hop water at zero alcohol.

Athletic Brewing built a national business on this slot, which shows how many guests were waiting for it. One NA option is enough to start, and a second only when the first sells without help.

The regulator draws the line at half a percent. TTB's presentation on low and no alcohol drinks says that beverages in liquid form that contain not less than one-half of one percent alcohol by volume and are intended for human consumption are alcohol beverages. Read the can for what it claims, and ask the regulator what a product is.

The numbers: three non-beer slots against a draft

Here is the arithmetic for one draft and two non-beer items. Profit per bar minute is contribution divided by seconds to serve, times sixty. Prices and costs are examples, so substitute your own.

The draft wins on this arithmetic. The seltzer can is the fastest sale on the table, at fifteen seconds, but its price is low. The NA six-pack trails because its cost is high against its price.

Trailing is not the same as cutting. These slots earn their place by keeping a group at the table, and the group's other orders do not show in a single-item row. Run the same table with your own costs and pour times before you decide anything.

Four steps to review the non-beer slots

Keep the review to one page and one sitting. The goal is a decision for each non-beer item, not a report.

Packaging changes the bar-time number, so the can and the label matter. Packaging and label rules are set out separately, and they apply to anything you fill or sell to go.

A checklist before you add a slot

Run the list before a new cider, seltzer or NA item goes on the card. Each line is a yes or no, and any no is a reason to wait a week.

What licensing decides before the list does

Licensing sets what you may sell and where. What you may sell to go, and in what container, is set by your license, not by your preference. The licensing and compliance guide covers the sequence.

Questions about what may be stated on a label or a menu should go to the federal regulator and to a licensed attorney rather than be inferred. That holds for a seltzer you make, a cider you bottle and an NA beer you brew.

Training the crew to describe the slot

A non-beer slot only works if the crew can sell it in one sentence. New staff should describe every item in a sentence a guest would recognize and should know which questions they must not guess at.

That capability belongs in the hiring and training the crew sequence rather than being left to absorb itself. Cider and NA guests ask the most basic questions, and a confident answer is what turns a curious guest into a regular.

Recording what actually sells

Once a week, pull the sales mix by item and by hour. After a month you will have a ranked list of what earns its place in your room, which differs from the list above and from every other taproom's.

Use it two ways. First, cut the bottom of the list and put the freed capacity behind the top. Second, let it inform what you stock next. The monthly numbers to track include profit per bar minute, so the same record serves both.

Common questions

Should the tap list show tasting notes?

Show enough to answer the two or three most common questions in your room, and keep it short enough to read while standing. A dense description is read by nobody and a bare name helps nobody.

What if we cannot answer a dietary question?

Say so plainly and offer to check. Guessing on a restriction question is the one place where a friendly answer can cause real harm.

Do I need an NA option and a seltzer and a cider?

Start with the one your guests ask for most, and add the next when the first sells without help. The review above tells you when a slot has earned its shelf space.

Does this list change as we grow?

The measure stays the same. The ranking changes, especially if you add food, add takeaway, or expand the room. Redo the weekly count after any change of that size.