- As hard seltzer fever continues to sweep the nation, three new brands hit the market in the past two weeks alone, clamoring to capture a piece of a market anticipated to reach $2.5 billion by 2021.
- Members of Business Insider's retail, transportation, and careers teams conducted a hard seltzer tasting of nine brands, spanning a collective 34 flavors.
- White Claw was the near-unanimous winner. Here's what we thought.
- Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.
It's hard seltzer's world this summer, we're just living in it.
Seemingly overnight, this bubbly alcoholic concoction has become a nationwide sensation, prompting a smattering of memes and a legion of unabashed "bro" fans. Though brands like White Claw and Truly established themselves as early favorites within the hard seltzer canon, within just two weeks three new products have joined the market: Natural Light Seltzer, Pabst Blue Ribbon Stronger Seltzer, and Four Loko Seltzer.
With such an abundance of hard seltzer at our disposal, it can be difficult to sift through the noise. In order to help you navigate these strange new alcoholic waters, I put together a workplace taste-test of nine brands of hard seltzer currently available to the public.
Read more: 'Claw is the law': Why American 'bros' suddenly can't get enough of White Claw hard seltzer
Eight of us from Business Insider's retail, transportation, and careers teams took over a conference room this week to sample the ever-growing array of beverages. Across these nine brands, we sipped a collective 34 flavors, in variations ranging from "lemon agave hibiscus" to "raspberry rosé." (Sadly, we were not able to get our hands on the just-announced PBR Stronger Seltzer in time for the test, and we all have to wait until the fourth quarter of 2019 for a taste of Four Loko Seltzer in all 14% of its ABV glory.)
Overall, we came to the unwavering conclusion that Claw really is the law, and we unanimously despised Natural Light Hard Seltzer. Check out the rest of our thoughts, below: