While everyone can agree on the health benefits of taking part in Dry January, not every business will stay as healthy over the month.
“Last year, I think we were probably a little more like, ‘Oh (no), what are we going to do?” said Ben Feifarek, co-owner of Working Draft Beer Company. “I guess now we’re still a little bit like that, but it’s just, ‘OK, it’s here. Let’s embrace it.’”
Like a number of Madison area establishments, Working Draft at 1129 E. Wilson St. sells nonalcoholic options for Dry January, a popular trend where people choose to abstain from alcohol for a month. The brewery has other companies’ NA beer on the menu. It also makes its own hop water (a calorie-, alcohol- and sugar-free drink) with Simcoe hops that is available on tap. And on Jan. 24, it will host a Dry January party like last year, with mocktail classes and a food popup.
January buying habits generally dip overall after a big holiday season. But as sobriety becomes more common and Dry January rises in popularity, businesses dealing in alcoholic and nonalcoholic drinks are seeing challenges and opportunities.
Fellow brewery owner Tim Piotrowski said Delta Beer Labs’ sales have averaged a drop of 18.3% during January.
“January, in my 17 years of industry experience, has always been a lower sales month,” Piotrowski said. While in years past that may have been due to holiday spending, he also points to Dry January for smaller sales.
He carefully manages staff schedules to account for the lower sales, and offers an array of NA beverages for consumers.
Taking NA to new heights
When Blind Shot Social Club opened four years ago at 177 S Fair Oaks Ave., nonalcoholic beverages were beginning to take off. Owners Brent Mann and Michelle Duvall opened their business intending to serve NA drinks from the start, in addition to standard alcoholic beverages.
The husband and wife duo don’t drink alcohol, with Duvall, a bartender for 21 years, quitting fermented beverages 11 years ago.
Back then, Duvall remembers that people would often ask her why she wasn’t drinking, opting for Diet Coke instead. Even when she launched the NA menu at Blind Shot, some people would remark, “Well, I don’t know why you would want that.”
Now, Duvall doesn’t hear such negativity surrounding NA drinks. Attitudes appear to be changing.
She said Blind Shot probably had the largest NA menu in Madison when it opened, and possibly Wisconsin. She made NA cocktails like she would if she was using regular gin or bourbon.
“I wanted to provide inclusive options for people that are cool and interesting and fancy for any time,” Duvall said.
The program has gone well, with nonalcoholic drink sales making up 15% of Duvall’s sales, more than coffee, wine and soda. Although 60% of bar sales over the year are still alcohol-based, Duvall said “it’s been incredibly successful for us financially,” to have NA options.
Selling NA options at the bar has been a boon as well as Blind Shot’s portion of the business selling bottles of nonalcoholic spirits to go.
One downside to NA options Duvall said is that some cost just as much or more than their alcoholic counterparts, and can have a much shorter shelf life.
Allowing patrons to purchase a bottle of the nonalcoholic spirit they enjoyed in a cocktail has helped alleviate pressure on the bar side of the business.
“We do see more people coming in looking at the retail section, asking questions and talking to us more about NA options,” Duvall said of Dry January.
To keep the bar menu fresh, Duvall updates it twice a year. She usually has seven NA beers available, 18 NA cocktails and seven NA wine options.
Merchant, a gastropub located at 121 S. Pinckney St., launched a Dry January NA cocktail menu on Wednesday, and offers a buy one get one offer for the drinks.
Bar manager Abby Hill said the menu and deal are about creating an environment, rather than just offering booze. Patrons can opt for a NA offering or THC seltzer.
Bringing those people in is important during January, Rule No. One Hospitality Group COO Tara Goldberg said. The hospitality group manages Merchant and Lucille.
“Being able to capture any sale in January is super critical in restaurants here in Wisconsin because we’re so seasonal,” she said.
Goldberg said a robust nonalcoholic menu doesn’t make Merchant profitable in January, but it gets people to come out and visit.
“We lose less money; that is the hope for January,” Goldberg said with a laugh.
Retail during Dry January
Brock Cummings is the beer buyer and alcohol manager for local grocery store Brennan’s Market, and he said it is not unusual for alcohol sales to dip in January. That’s been true since before Dry January was popularized.
“People tend to spend big for the holidays then tighten up for a bit in January and February,” Cummings said. “New Year’s resolutions have also always been a thing and many people choose to get healthier and cut back or eliminate alcohol consumption.”
Before NA became so eclectic in its offerings, Cummings would see a bump in juices and kombuchas. Now NA sales see a bump each January, and even year-round.
“Gen Z seems to be much more conscientious with alcohol, or at least have gotten a later start than previous generations,” Cummings said.
He tries to promote NA products all year with a larger emphasis during January, October and December.
“NA as an entire category is continuing to grow year over year with more customers showing interest, though the types of beverages that are most popular have fluctuated,” he said.
Cummings said NA beer took off with craft beer drinkers before spreading to other customers. And although NA beer and hop water — basically a water drink with hops in it — have been steady at his store, ready-to-drink canned mocktails have begun to thrive.
“NA wine and NA spirits both have a ways to go,” he said. “There are some bright spots, but overall none of them are truly knock-your-socks-off great mostly due to the chemistry and composition of those products. Beer has added carbonation that can cover up differences in mouthfeel and flavor between NA and real beer, but wine and spirits have nowhere to hide and can feel flat, thin and one-dimensional.”
Just under four miles north at Sober Social, a store dedicated to nothing but NA products, owner Kristi Tanner has had much more luck with spirits.
Tanner advocates for sobriety through community. Her store is one way she helps to do that.
“The first thing that people say when they walk in the door is, ‘I had no idea there were so many options,’” Tanner said.
Her store saw a huge spike in shoppers when the U.S. surgeon general issued a warning about alcohol being directly linked to at least seven cancers in January 2025.
“Last year, Dry January was my best month by a landslide,” Tanner said. “We’ve always known that (alcohol is linked to cancer), but when somebody of that kind of stature comes down with that sort of messaging, it’s like, new people are hearing it from different places.”
She met a lot of people who cut back on drinking, and saw the perspective of sobriety shift to something of an opportunity and badge of honor.
NA beer is something her shoppers are confident in buying when they may be a little tepid about purchasing a $50 bottle of NA tequila. But samples have helped, and she has surprised a lot of people with the quality of some beverages.
Tanner remembers an older couple who came into the store. One partner had been sober for 43 years and had never heard of NA whiskey. So she poured them a sample.
“They were so excited,” Tanner said. “They are like, ‘Oh, honey, oh my God, we’re gonna be able to have an old fashioned. This is bringing back nostalgia for them.
“The store is reaching a much larger population than I thought it was, which is really nice. People want these options. College students are not drinking the way they used to.”
And for someone on her own sobriety quest, having been sober for about six years, Tanner understands not only the importance of creating a community and social aspect to connect NA drinkers, but also the location of the products.
She said she couldn’t fathom walking into a big box alcohol store to purchase an NA beer, having to walk past the samples, the hundreds of alcoholic options to the NA aisle without giving into temptation.
“As an alcoholic, in recovery, please tell me that this makes sense,” Tanner said.
“That’s insanity. That’s not an answer that works for me.”
And that is why Tanner opened Sober Social.
“I opened the store because I wanted to find friends,” she said. “I wanted to make sobriety beautiful. The opposite of addiction is connection.”
A drinks fest without alcohol
Tyler Maas is the co-founder of website Milwaukee Record. The platform hosts numerous events, but one it began in 2022 leaned into NA beverages.
N/A Day is a “Dry January beverage festival” hosted in Milwaukee and Madison. Madison’s event will take place at the Bur Oak located at 2262 Winnebago St. on Saturday. Tickets cost $20 in advance or $30 at the door, and there is a session from noon to 2 p.m. and 2 to 4 p.m. In 2024, during its inaugural event in the capital city, the fest sold out.
“I initially decided to start N/A Day in Milwaukee in 2022 because I was noticing a gradual uptick in nonalcoholic offerings and I wanted to give a platform to highlight some of those items while also helping a not-insignificant portion of the population to feel seen and acknowledged here in our famously hard-drinking state,” Maas said.
Madison’s version of the fest has NA beer from Athletic Brewing and Milwaukee’s Lakefront Brewery, as well as botanical NA spirits, kombuchas, mocktails, energy drinks and THC products.
“If there’s a preferred drink-related avenue, there’s a good chance we’ll have something that fits that’s available to try and, in some cases, purchase right on-site to enjoy at home,” Maas said.
And Maas really wants to hammer a point home: this fest is for everyone.
“I drink, but I still love trying new-to-me products and adding non-alcoholic products to my arsenal for the situations where I’d rather not drink,” Maas said. “Some people who attend dip in and out of drinking. Others are 100 percent sober or are in recovery.”
Expanded choices
Fitchburg-based Mock and Co. owner Firoz Khimani remembers someone asking him, “Why would you do this to a Wisconsin old fashioned?” when he was demoing the product at an event.
That being said, he wanted to create something nonalcoholic and tasty for himself and others.
For Mock and Co., Thanksgiving led to the biggest bump in sales. Khimani’s product range has grown, and he offers an old fashioned mocktail that is sweet, one with no added sugar, a sour version and one with spiced cranberry.
Based on the variety of products and support of customers, NA options seem poised to grow and become a larger part of people’s habits.
“I had a guy come in the other day and he was like, ‘I’ve never been here. I’m a regular drinker, but I’m having a big party and I know I have some family members that don’t drink. Do you have any suggestions of what I should get?’ Tanner said.
“And I was like, ‘First of all, I just want to say thank you on behalf of every non-drinker in the whole wide world, because I can’t tell you what that will say to these people.
“When they go to the drink spot… there is something that is not a water and not a Diet Coke.’”
