Athletic Brewing and the Rise of NA Beer | The Well

The Story of Athletic Brewing

In the world of craft beer, where hops are king and IPAs reign supreme, a Connecticut upstart named Athletic Brewing has been busy rewriting the rulebook – and it’s not even tipsy doing it. Founded in 2017, in a world where beer traditionally spells B-O-O-Z-E, Athletic dared to ask, “What if we skip the alcohol?” Crazy? Maybe. Genius? Absolutely.

Here’s the kicker: while traditional craft beer sales are doing the hokey pokey of uncertainty, thanks to everything from wallet-busting inflation to beer bellies going out of style, Athletic’s non-alcoholic brews are partying like it’s 1999. With a growth spurt of 25.2% in the last year, these guys are the cool kids in a school where NA beer is still the new kid on the block, making up less than 1% of beer consumption. Talk about punching above your weight.

Athletic Brewing’s jump from No. 27 to No. 13 on the Brewers Association’s Top 50 is like the nerdy kid in high school suddenly becoming prom king – it’s unexpected and a little bit awesome. As the first NA brewer to crash this party, they’re proving that skipping the alcohol doesn’t mean skipping the flavor. Even the bigwigs like Keurig Dr Pepper have tossed $50 million into Athletic’s hat, and when you’ve got celebs like J.J. Watt and David Chang hanging in your corner, you know you’re not just brewing beer, you’re brewing buzz.

But wait, there’s more! Athletic runs as a Certified B Corp with its ‘Fit For All Times’ campaign, and the company landed on Time’s “100 Most Influential Companies of 2022.” Whatever you make of NA beer, the business result is not in dispute: they took a category nobody wanted and made it a shelf staple.

The masterminds behind this sober sensation? Bill Shufelt and John Walker, the dynamic duo who looked at the beer world and said, “Hold my beer – actually, hold my non-alcoholic beer.” When he teamed up with Walker, a seasoned craft brewer who shared his restless energy, their mission crystallized: brew an NA beer using full craft-brewing methods rather than the old approach of making regular beer and stripping the alcohol out afterward. That production difference is the company’s actual bet, and the sales numbers above are the market grading it.

In a craft beer scene full of predictable plots, Athletic is the twist nobody saw coming: one of the industry’s growth stories contains less than 0.5% alcohol by volume, which is the legal definition of non-alcoholic in the US. That number is the entire product. Everything else is brewing.

Why I Love Athletic Brewing

• The lineup covers the standard craft styles, IPA to golden to dark, so switching to NA doesn’t mean switching categories.
• They hit the spot when you drink them cold and freshly opened. Non-alcoholic beers can lose their bubbles faster than alcoholic ones.

Cheers,
Ryan McCann
Growth & Marketing, Saucey

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