The lager shandy evokes nostalgia for many pub goers. The lager-lemonade combo was once used to moderate beer, but it’s fallen out of favour since the growth of non-alcoholic brands. If you look at the wider non-alcoholic beer sector, it’s dominated by trademark brands replicating their successful lager, just without the alcohol.

This strategy makes a lot of sense and is clearly working, but when it comes to innovation, I believe this comes from independent, craft producers.

Taking out a functional ingredient like alcohol puts more importance on the taste of a product, and I think a shandy can elevate the flavour of beer. However, poor-quality lemonade, cheap lager and inconsistent ratios are likely contributing factors to the shandy’s demise, which is why there’s a fantastic opportunity in the non-alcoholic sector for a booze-less one.

Earlier this year, we announced plans to launch a canned non-alcoholic shandy called Daystar. It’s a premium offering based off a lager flavour with Sicilian lemonade at zero alcohol, less than 50 calories and initially in 33cl. We have the recipe, the brand, activations and strategy all ready to go, but given the growth of Sylva we postponed the project until the timing is right for us.

Another common step by established beer brands is to dealcoholise an existing beer, but that’s not our style. We started from scratch and established extracts from which to build the flavour, which allows more control over the process.

Daystar taps into the crossover between the non-alcoholic sector and soft drinks, which I think is a really interesting space. Consumers often complain about a lack of sophisticated options when not drinking alcohol, but a well-executed 0% shandy like Daystar can be the link between a soft drink and a sessionable non-alcoholic beer. 

Ben Branson founded the world’s first non-alcoholic spirit brand, Seedlip, in 2015 and three years later, Diageo bought the majority share. Since then, Branson has launched Seasn cocktail bitters and runs a successful charity podcast about neurodivergence called The Hidden 20%. His most recent project, Sylva, uses advanced technology to create the effects of wood ageing on non-alcoholic spirits.