The Kardashian family’s recently launched vodka soda brand is on a mission to stand out in the competitive ready-to-drink cocktail market, a plan that also includes partnering with another popular alcohol brand within the family’s business empire.
Kylie Jenner’s Sprinter debuted in March of this year in four flavors: black cherry, lime, grapefruit, and peach. The brand points to shipping 140,000 cases in its first month as a sign of early success, and it debuted at the Coachella music festival in April.
One can of Sprinter contains 100 calories, 4.5% ABV, premium vodka, fruit juice and soda water.
The brand is currently operated by Calabasas Beverage Company, a venture that also owns brands launched by the Kardashian family. The current lineup includes Kendall Jenner’s tequila brand 818, which debuted in 2021 and reported 65% year-over-year growth in January with Blanco, Reposado and Añejo varieties.
Kylie Jenner’s Sprinter Can Vodka Soda.
Provided by Sprinter
The company’s CEO, Mike Novy, a beverage industry veteran, said in an interview that the creation of Sprinter came naturally from Kylie’s idea to create a less artificial-flavored vodka soda. At first, he Kylie Workshop Ideas. When the product was ready to hit shelves last spring, the dynamics of the two brands, the 818 and the Sprinter, became the focus for Novy and his family.
“Sprinter had a different route to market than other distributors, coming from early entrants,” Novy said. “We had meetings with the two largest retailers in the U.S. alcohol beverage space, and the message was very clear: You need to go with one group of distributors.”
According to Novy, Calabasas Beverage Company is a “reverse holding company” owned 50/50 by the Sprinter and 818 teams. He said that arrangement allows the brands’ strategies to be more in sync.
Sprinter will soon be releasing a second variety pack with four new, yet-to-be-announced flavors, and the CEO says the brand is aiming to move toward bolder flavors that balance sweetness and acidity.
“We want to provide a positive sensory experience beyond just taste, from a carbonation and overall consumption perspective,” Novy said.
RTD demand surges
The ready-to-drink canned cocktail market is expanding every day, with new entrants entering the market with unique blends of liquor, juice, soda, and even plant-based ingredients. According to Grand View Research, the RTD cocktail market is expected to grow to $2.4 billion by 2030, growing at a CAGR of 14%.
Compared to the late 2010s, when hard seltzers first gained popularity and ushered in a major shift in the alcohol market, today’s RTD cocktail drinkers are more knowledgeable about the spirits and ingredients that go into the drinks they buy, Novi believes.
“One of the big pushes Kylie made was to make it really high-quality, true to the fruit. We didn’t want anything artificial,” Novi said. “Consumers are becoming more discerning in terms of flavor profiles, and that’s a dynamic that’s happened in almost every alcohol category. As you’ve seen in beer, people have moved away from mass brands to wanting something more artisanal.”
According to Novy, Sprint is uniquely positioned to benefit from this consumer shift thanks to the Kardashian-Jenner family’s social media presence, which has hundreds of millions of followers on social media.
818 Tequila has teamed up with influencer Emma Chamberlain’s Chamberlain Coffee and New York City Italian restaurant Laos to launch a tequila-infused espresso martini and pasta sauce. The potential to work with top brands puts Sprinter at an advantage over other startups trying to break into the alcohol category. But Novy says the brand is still in the early stages of planning its next moves.
“It’s all about making people feel like they belong to something more than just a drink,” Novy said. “I’ve been in the alcohol business for 35 years and I’ve worked on a lot of great brands, but I’ve never seen a brand where consumers are this excited and passionate about the experience.”
