H2Whoa — the radical rebranding of water

Every generation has had its own modish way to hydrate. Louis XIV insisted on spring water ferried by mule from Châteldon in the Auvergne; in more recent times no backstage shot from Fashion Week seems to be complete without a bottle of Fiji somewhere in the frame.  

The latest water brands to cause a stir are making drinks that behave more like beers or energy drinks. They’re provocative, eye-catching and come in a can — and they’re an increasingly noisy part of a single-serve water market in the US that’s worth $34.4bn and growing.

Market leader Liquid Death — tagline: “Murder Your Thirst” — comes in a tallboy with gnarly heavy-metal stylings. It launched in 2019 with a plain still water sourced from the Austrian Alps, before diversifying into sparkling. Today, it’s a $1.4bn hydration brand encompassing plain water, iced teas, seltzers and electrolyte powders, plus merch ranging from Liquid Death watches and hair pomades to sweatshirts and cat toys. 

The brand was conceived by the Californian graphic designer Mike Cessario after he noticed fans backstage at Vans Warped Tour drinking water out of Monster Energy cans. “A lot of the brands that are in the alternative space are really unhealthy,” he said to Eater in 2021. “It’s a lot of cheap gross beer and energy drinks. We wanted to give people permission to participate in this cool rock ’n’ roll brand without needing to consume something gross.”

A lot of the brands that are in the alternative space are really unhealthy

Liquid Death contains nothing more toxic than H2O, but it cultivates a noxious image. It’s notorious for its tongue‑in-cheek marketing and funny, often gory videos and memes. Its viral content has made it one of the most-followed drinks brands on TikTok, while partnerships with counterculture celebrities including Machine Gun Kelly and skateboarder Tony Hawk have also helped build its credibility with Gen Z. 

Liquid Death positions itself as an environmentally friendly brand — “Death to Plastic” is another of its mottoes. But while its fans may still consider it underground, you can now buy it at Tesco (at three times the price of Evian — a case of Emperor’s New Clothes?).

Following along in Liquid Death’s wake is the canned water brand Not Beer — a “zero-carb, zero-alcohol, zero-taste ‘beer’” that is cheerfully absurd. Derived from local water sources in the US, and packaged in livery reminiscent of Budweiser, it “allows the consumer to buy into the beer fantasy world of good times without any of the downsides that come with alcohol”, says founder Dillon Dandurand, a former investment banker and co-founder of the bean-based pasta brand Brami, which is made from the high-protein, low-carb “superbean” lupini.  

“Feeling comfortable drinking water in a social setting is not the only problem Not Beer solves,” he says. “The main thing is that your current water options are boring and invoke next to no emotion. Not Beer is your fun water option. It evokes those feelings alcohol companies sell us — fun, relaxation, confidence, inclusion.”

Fresh out of the UK grime scene comes Drip, a canned water from the rapper and TV personality Big Zuu (‘‘‘Drip’ means clothes,” he says. “If you’ve got drip, you’ve got style”). Drip doesn’t explicitly court the beer market — Big Zuu is Muslim — but like its peers the company is setting out to be a lifestyle brand, producing video, music and street art collabs under the title Drip Curates. Also keen to tout its green credentials, it’s canned at source in the chalky South Downs in the south of England. I blind-tasted it against some competitors and it was good: pure and polished. My nine-year-old, meanwhile, enjoyed strutting around the house brandishing the flashy black-and-gold can, like some kind of proto-lad.  

Hydration has become aspirational

“Hydration has become aspirational,” says Joanna Lowry, head of strategy at Protein brand agency. She cites the rise of the Stanley cup, the $900 Dior water bottle and “a wave of new luxury water-filter systems like Walter and Endless Rhythm” as testament to this. “Drinking canned water is a way to lead a life of self-optimisation while still retaining a countercultural spirit.” It’s slightly depressing to think that today’s version of sticking it to The Man amounts to chugging water and paying three times the price for it. But you have to applaud the evil genius of the brands that made it so; they are the new homeopaths.

It’s well documented that increasing numbers of adults are now reducing their alcohol intake. It’s estimated that between a fifth and a quarter of young adults are now teetotal. And the canned-water-as-beer phenomenon is just one example of a boom in proxy drinks that offer abstainers alcohol-free refreshment with adult positioning. A corollary of this trend is the rise of hop water, especially in the US — sparkling mineral waters that are flavoured with hops, giving them a citrussy bitterness vaguely reminiscent of a beer.

Sierra Nevada Hop Splash, $23.28 for 12 cans

Hop Wtr Classic, $36.99 for 12 cans

On a recent trip to a Whole Foods in New York, I encountered chiller cabinets brimming with hop waters from established brewers like Sierra Nevada and Lagunitas, as well as standalone brands like Hop Wtr, which comes in a range of fruit flavours, embellished with nootropics. (In the event I bought Sierra Nevada Hop Splash, which proved to be an excellent midday refresher.) 

“Hop-water-type products check a lot of those same boxes as non-alcoholic beer or mocktails due to zero-ABV, and they also align with the ascension of sparkling water consumption over the past 10 years,” says Mary Guiver, principal category merchant for Beer at Whole Foods Market.

The British craft brewer Northern Monk launched the UK’s first sparkling hop water, Holy Hop Water, in 2021 — and it proved so popular that the brewer now produces four variants flavoured with Citra, El Dorado and Sabro hops. The plain Citra variety is wonderfully thirst-quenching — I drink it at home a lot. “It’s stocked in bottle shops for the traditional craft beer drinker, but we also know it’s being drunk by people who don’t drink any alcohol,” says head brewer and co-founder Brian Dickson, “as well as bands and people playing sports.”

This blurring of boundaries in water is something we’re now increasingly seeing in drinks across the board — a phenomenon that’s being driven by a new generation of consumers who are comfortable with definitions in general being much more fluid. Which makes a trip to Whole Foods a lot more exciting — but also a bit more confusing. So next time you reach for that can in the chiller, just make sure you read the small print. 

@alicelascelles