Kids buying non-alcoholic beverages: Should we worry?

Baltimore, famous for its lively bars and local beers, is seeing a new trend take off. More and more people across the country are looking for drinks without alcohol, and local business owner Darryl Collins has jumped on this opportunity. He's opened Hopscotch, a one-of-a-kind place that offers a huge choice of over 200 drinks without any alcohol. This new spot is catching the eye of many Baltimore residents who want something different from the usual night out.

Collins started his business in August of last year to meet the growing demand for drinks without alcohol. People who want to drink less, avoid hangovers, or improve their health should try these drinks. The drinks have less than 0.5% booze in them.

Collins says, “Every day, people are buying bottles of [non-alcoholic] wine – that is our top seller. Outside of that, it’s going to be what we call a ready-to-drink canned beverage, like canned cocktails.”

The non-alcoholic beverage sector has had significant growth in recent years, especially amidst the COVID-19 pandemic. As per the industry group, these beverages are presently making a yearly contribution of more than $500 million to the US economy.

Since there’s hardly any alcohol in them, you can find these drinks anywhere - grocery stores, corner shops, and all over the internet. But Collins has his own rules at Hopscotch - he won’t sell to anyone under 18 and checks IDs to make sure.

“When there’s no minimum age, can a nine-year-old come into your store and buy a non-alcoholic Corona? For me, I don’t want that perception,” Collins explained.

Collins made this call on his own, since Maryland - like most states - has no rules about how old you need to be to buy these drinks.

With no real rules in place, some health experts are pushing for age limits on these non-alcoholic drinks. Molly Bowdring, a clinical psychologist and researcher at the Stanford Prevention Research Center, wrote about it in a big medical journal for kids’ doctors.

Bowdring worries that these drinks might be a gateway to the real thing for kids. She points out how similar these drinks are to actual alcohol - they taste and smell alike, and people drink them in the same way.

The researcher did some digging and found out that 39 states don’t have any rules about selling these adult-style non-alcoholic drinks. The few states with regulations showed inconsistencies in their approach.

While there’s no proof yet that these drinks are leading kids to alcohol, Bowdring thinks it could go the way of e-cigs and smoking. “If we leave the door open to there being a marketing push for non-alcoholic beverages among kids, could that then lead to increased alcohol use among this generation? We don’t want to wait to find out if that’s going to happen,” she says.

According to an article in NPR, Marcos Salazar, Head of the Adult Non-Alcoholic Beverage Association says he agrees kids shouldn’t be drinking these products, but doesn’t want the government involved. Salazar says they’re focusing on grown-ups and helping people cut back on drinking.

Some big stores like Target are already carding people for these drinks, even without being told to. Collins is all for this DIY approach, saying, “We have to self-police because if we don’t self-police and self-regulate, that’s when the government regulates.”

As more and more people get into these booze-free options, the industry has to figure out how to keep it easy for adults to buy while making sure kids aren’t getting their hands on it.