Vaughan entrepreneur riding 'hard rootbeer' wave

Yorkregion.com
June 10, 2016
By Adam Martin-Robbins

Brothers Bruno and Davide Codispoti have tasted success with various ventures over the years, but now the foodie entrepreneurs feel they’ve tapped into a mammoth new trend that has them foaming at the mouth, with excitement.

What is it, you ask? Hard (aka alcoholic) root beer, for grownups.

“Over the last 20 years, my brother and I have launched over 100 unique products into the grocery and food sector. With each one, you try and predict that trend ... and we can say that we’ve never experienced anything like this,” said Bruno, a Vaughan resident.

“Right now, we’re riding at the top of this monster tsunami wave. We don’t know when it’s going to break, but we really hit it.”

The brothers, co-founders of 361 Degrees Inc., started out in the food industry about two decades ago and found success by bringing popular restaurant brands into local supermarkets, among them Kernels Popcorn seasonings and Pizza Pizza dipping sauces.

About four years ago, they entered the alcoholic beverage market with a line of all-natural, “culinary cocktails” under the Crazy Uncle brand name, which includes Blood Orange Rosemary & Maple Punch and Uber Caesar best recognized by their signature one-litre, moonshine-type jugs.

Last year, the Codispotis, who are constantly tracking hot food and beverage trends, noticed hard root beer was taking the American booze market by storm.

It started with Not Your Father’s Root Beer, produced by Illinois-based craft brewer Small Town Brewery and several other players, including giants such as Anheuser-Busch, quickly jumped on the bandwagon.

The Codispotis decided to create their own version, Crazy Uncle Hard Root Beer, in hopes the trend would catch fire in Canada.

Using what they’d learned from their previous cocktail adventures - for which they teamed up with booze and food experts such as Frankie Solarik, of BarChef, and brothers Michael and Guy Rubino, formerly co-hosts of the Food Network’s Made to Order – they planned to make a tasty, craft soda first then figure out the alcohol base.

It took them several months to perfect the recipe.

“The common thread has always been, and we’re never going to change that, what we do with Crazy Uncle cocktails is good ingredients, real flavours,” Davide, a Toronto resident, said. “If we’re doing a root beer, we want it to be the best root beer, not just getting on the trend and trying to put a root beer out there in time to be part of the trend.”

Crazy Uncle Hard Root Beer features flavours of sarsaparilla, sweet birch, wintergreen and licorice root with a creamy vanilla finish.

It’s not overly sweet and is softly carbonated.

Unlike many other hard root beers, which use malted barley to essentially create a flavoured beer, Crazy Uncle’s 5-per-cent alcohol kick comes from vodka so as not to detract from the other flavours.

“We worked to make sure that there was a nice balance,” Bruno said. “As foodies, we look at how that beverage tastes at the beginning, in the middle and at the end of that flavour experience.”

As with their other “ready-to-drink” cocktails, they wanted to produce an all-natural beverage with no preservatives and no artificial flavours or colours.

So, for instance, they used cane sugar rather than glucose or high fructose corn syrup to sweeten it. And they pasteurized their root beer, eliminating the need for artificial preservatives.

Instead of a moonshine-jug, Crazy Uncle Hard Root Beer comes in a 473 ml beige can featuring a faceless man sporting a bowler hat with Crazy Uncle written on it, a handle bar moustache dripping with foam and a monocle.

It sells here for $2.95 per can.

And, so far, it’s proving extremely popular.

"During Crazy Uncle Hard Root Beer’s brief time in market, this product has already made quite a name for itself,” Jeryca Dillas, LCBO’s product manager ready to drink, wrote in an email. “With over 2,650 cases sold and net sales greater than $160,000 since its late-April release, it’s safe to say that this is a cooler with a strong following. Existing ready-to-drink consumers and those new to the wonderful world of coolers are all flocking to stores to purchase one of this season’s greatest new additions!”

The response in Alberta has, reportedly, been the same.

"Our customers cannot get enough of the Crazy Uncle Root Beer,” Ryan Tycholas, BASELINE Wine & Spirit Co. in Edmonton wrote in an email. “We tell them it is all-natural and made in Canada and the response has been overwhelming! Every time we taste people on it, they get hooked and we literally can't keep it on the shelves."
The Codispotis aren’t the only ones in Canada getting in on the action.

Mill Street, bought last year by Belgian beer behemoth by Anheuser-Busch InBev SA/NV, brews Distillery Root Beer.

Oakville’s Iconic Brewing Co., launched Dusty Boots hard root beer late last year and, in March, Molson Coors Brewing Co. unveiled Mad Jack Premium Hard Root Beer.

Captain Morgan’s rum-based Spiked Root Beer, which also comes in a tall can, is also available here.

The Codispoti brothers know it’s just a matter of time before the larger, popular American brands cross the border.

“When it comes to competitors ... they’re coming on three times as fast as they normally would,” Bruno said. “Right now, we know everybody’s nipping at our heels, so it’s (about) gaining the platform and the traction.”

To help solidify their market position, they’re forging partnerships with restaurants and licensed cafés to offer their product either on its own or in a root beer float.

Joe Rabeed jumped on board when they approached him about serving Crazy Uncle Root Beer floats at Woodbridge’s Spin Dessert Cafe & Bistro.

“It was mixing in that dessert part of it also being very different and unique,” he said.

As with many food trends, it’s unclear how long this wave will last, but for now Bruno said they’re enjoying the ride.

“We’re having fun with it because it’s sort of that nostalgic drink that makes people happy immediately.”