The number of legal drinking age (LDA) Gen Z consumers who drink alcohol has reached parity with older generations, research suggests.
Around 74% of LDA Gen Z now drink alcohol*, compared to 76% of the total cohort of LDA+ adults, according to the IWSR’s twice-yearly ‘Bevtrac’ survey of consumer behaviour. While the proportion of the overall population who drink beverage alcohol has decreased in the last three years, Gen Z – defined as adults between the legal drinking age in their country of residence and 28 years old – are drinking more, closing the gap from six percentage points to two.
Analysis of the findings has been published in a joint report between AB InBev, the IWSR and IPSOS, ‘The Consumer Trends Shaping Adult Beverages’, released this week.
“Frequency [of consumption] remains broadly stable, and Gen Z of legal drinking age engagement is increasing, even as consumers drink less per occasion,” the report said. “Together, these trends illustrate how the alcohol category is evolving, with growth opportunities emerging as consumer preferences and category dynamics continue to shift.
“The participation gap between Gen Z of legal drinking age and the wider population of drinkers appears to have disappeared entirely, with no significant difference across markets.”
Speaking to Global Drinks Intel earlier this year, Suntory Global Spirits CEO Greg Hughes said: “Gen Z is adopting alcohol at similar rates to previous generations, but … It’s just a smaller generation.
“Where you do see population growth, particularly in younger consumers, is in Latin America, India and emerging Asia,” he added. “So, you’ve got a different set of consumers coming in: they live in a different place and they’re drinking differently.”
*Including those who have drunk beverage alcohol at least once in the past six months, from a data pool of 32,000 respondents across fifteen “key” markets
