Talking NA beer with Tate Huffard of Sausalito’s Best Day Brewing

While alcoholic drink sales are on the decline, nonalcoholic drinks, including beers, are growing in popularity. No longer relegated to the back of the fridge, the bright packaging and craft beer taste of nonalcoholic beer brands like Sausalito’s Best Day Brewing are breathing new life into the concept.

Today, nonalcoholic beer represents a growing market that could double within the decade: It was estimated at $20 billion globally in 2023 and is expected to rise to $40 billion by 2033, according to Fact.MR, a market research website. Best Day Brewing, which raised over $22 million last year, claims to be the fastest-growing craft nonalcoholic beer brand in the U.S. after its launch in 2022. We recently caught up with founder Tate Huffard to learn more.

Responses have been edited for length and clarity.

Q Tell us about the backstory behind Best Day Brewing. How did you get started?

A I’m originally from the Northeast, and moved out to California in 2010. I went hook, line and sinker on the whole lifestyle here. I got the surfboards and got into trail running and all those things. I was particularly enthralled with the way that beer was the connector in bringing people together, whether it was at live music or restaurants, parking lot beers after surfing or après ski. In my 20s, the math was simple: I could keep going, wake up the next morning, go to work and do it all over again. That calculus started to change in my 30s, when my friends and I noticed that we were doing less and less of those things we loved.

Everyone has their own route to realizing that what you put into your body — food, drink or alcohol intake — really matters. I tried with my friends and my wife to cut back on drinking, and we challenged each other not to drink during the week. The substitutes we tried were great, but not at all like drinking a beer. No group of buddies has ever gotten together in a parking lot with a bunch of seltzer waters, right?

I thought if I could make a great-tasting craft beer that happened to have no alcohol in it, with a really cool story to tell, it could fill a lot of voids that people were having. I knew I would love to be able to drink a great 6% ABV beer on the right occasion, and a great nonalcoholic beer on other occasions. But I don’t have a background in beer or beverages.

Q You started in finance, right?

A Yes, and then I was involved with a couple of startups out here. I came into this as a complete outsider. Years into devoting nights and weekends to the project, we had a proof of concept, which was a beer that, unless I told people it was nonalcoholic, they would think was a great, tasty beer.

Q How did you get there?

A A lot of trial and error, and connections. I learned that certain European countries had high single to low double-digit percentages of the nonalcoholic beer market compared to total beer consumed, while the U.S. was stuck at 0.3%. I thought, ‘They’re not completely different humans over there.’ This is a brand and quality problem.

Inch by inch, I made progress. And against that backdrop, I saw a tectonic shift in consumer health and wellness trends. People started paying attention to their sleep scores, and the millennial generation started to have kids. And, boy, does having a hangover with a 2-year-old make you rethink your consumption of alcohol.

Q Which came first: tasty N/A beer or the N/A arm of the wellness movement?

A The drinks came first, and you can see it in the numbers. Nonalcoholic beer has been around forever. It’s not like we invented nonalcoholic beer. What we did invent was great-tasting nonalcoholic beer and a great lifestyle story. As soon as that happened, people began participating. The growth has just been explosive, and we’re at the beginning of this ball game. We started in 2022 in earnest and now are in almost every single state across the country.

Now, the N/A category is roughly 2% of all beer sales. But in terms of grocery store sales, it’s closer to 5%, and in natural grocery stores, it’s up to 15% to 20%. We’re seeing participation rising not just in grocery store sales but on-premise at bars and restaurants.

The fascinating thing here is that at least 90% of the consumers of nonalcoholic beer still drink, myself included — they’re just drinking differently. The future of drinking does not look like everyone going sober; it’s more about having a choice. For some people, it might mean THC. Others might go completely sober, or practice “switch drinking” — alternating between traditional and nonalcoholic beers.

Q So what’s next?

A Lots! On the product side, we keep pushing the envelope with what’s possible in nonalcoholic beer. We’ve got a Mexican lager that is infused with fresh lime and sea salt — everything you want during warm weather. We’re releasing more products with cool partnerships. We’ve got a Belgian White that we’re releasing in partnership with the Surfrider Foundation. And we’ve done a pilsner with the Conservation Alliance.

We’re also excited about new opportunities with major chains across the country. We are continuing to grow in on-premise sales, and we’ve been doing a ton of sampling across the country.

Details: Find Best Day Brewing drinks at retailers in the Bay Area like Whole Foods, Mollie Stone’s, Trader Joe’s, Nugget Markets and more. bestdaybrewing.com.