To say a lot of things have changed in the last year is something of an understatement. Between lockdowns, social distancing and the rise of the zoom meeting, zoom party and a whole host of other zoom-related events, it can feel like the whole world has gone online. Few things seem to have changed as drastically as people’s shopping habits, and research shows that the trend towards e-commerce is unlikely to change anytime soon. Alcohol-specific online sales have also shown a big increase worldwide, and again, it is expected that many customers will stay online for the foreseeable future.
Online Craft Beer Sales Skyrocket in 2020
You may not expect it, but craft beer has been one of the big winners in the online sales revolution. From the start, liquor stores were ruled essential services in many countries. The result was an increase in wine sales, potentially too much drinking and an overall shift to online sales from alcohol vendors. With work from home measures active, many people found that the lack of a commute left them with more time, perhaps a perfect time to savour a drink? It probably also helped that the stress of the pandemic saw a general increase in alcohol consumption across the world. But it wasn’t just an increase in cheap booze to forget the problems of 2020; people were buying from high quality producers. Some craft brewers in London saw a 1000% increase in sales!
The key to this success: Online shopping. Even in New Zealand where we’ve been able to avoid some of the more devastating effects of Covid, we at Zeelandt Brewery noticed this boom in online shopping. In early 2020 we revamped our otherwise fairly plain online store, and we’ve seen our online business grow by more than 7 times our online sales in 2019!
Convenience, Safety and No Need to Leave the House
We can hardly blame people for wanting online shopping to stay. Buying online has perks that can be really helpful. For one thing, you don’t have to search the shop to find what you are after. On the Zeelandt Brewery online store, when you choose the self-collection option, all you need to do is swing by the shop at an agreed time, and your order will be ready and waiting, so you don’t have to enter the store or waste time trying to find one of our seasonal brews – we take care of that part for you!
Maybe you live in a really rural area? Even with the lower fuel prices that we saw in 2020, a long drive to pick up a case of our core range might cost nearly as much as having someone deliver them. And in the middle of winter when it’s freezing outside it certainly is more appealing. We don’t blame anyone for wanting to enjoy the convenience of online shopping and like we said, all signs point to e-commerce being prevalent in the future. Because of that, Zeelandt Brewery will keep refining our online store to make things easier for you to buy your craft beer online.