Each year, Market Watch Magazine sister publication Impact Newsletter salutes the top-performing brands across the drinks industry with its “Hot Brand” awards. This year, the Hot Brand roster includes 45 notable, fast-growing brands from the wine, spirits, and spirits-based RTD categories.
There are three different ways to qualify as an Impact Hot Brand: a contender must have shown double-digit growth in each year from 2023-2025, or be an established player with at least 15% growth in 2025, or be a top ten brand with at least 5% growth in 2025 and 15% growth since 2022. The minimum volume requirement for spirits and imported wines is 200,000 9-liter cases, while domestic wines and RTDs must meet a threshold of 250,000 cases.
Tequilas Lead Spirits Winners
Thirteen spirits labels earned Hot Brand honors for 2025, with Tequila brands leading the way once again. This year’s list, while smaller than in recent years, shows that despite industry headwinds there are still full-strength spirits brands finding ways to make strong connections with consumers. Overall, these winning brands totaled 9.6 million cases on 37% growth in 2025. Beyond Tequilas, three flavored whiskies and two liqueurs made the list, with one Bourbon, one American vodka, and one soju brand also represented among the Hot Brand winning labels.
Diageo’s Don Julio leads this year’s spirits Hot Brands class at 3.66 million cases. In 2025 the upscale Tequila grew 10%, muted compared to its torrid growth in previous years but still a strong showing given the overall market challenges and the specific hurdles facing Tequila. “Pressure on consumer wallets and an increasingly competitive environment, especially in Tequila, is having a marked adverse impact on U.S. spirits performance,” says Diageo CFO Nik Jhangiani.
In his summary of Diageo’s fiscal first half that ended December 31, 2025, Jhangiani pointed to lawsuits and media attention surrounding additives in Tequila as unneeded pressure on Don Julio and a source of the brand’s slowing sales. “We continue to view the litigation claims as baseless and are pushing for case dismissal in New York,” he said. “We are also working with industry influencers to inform the narrative, and we are confident that our Tequilas are crafted from 100% blue agave.”
In the face of these challenges, Diageo continues to innovate on Don Julio, particularly with variants of its luxury-priced 1942 release. In January, the company announced a Lunar New Year bottling celebrating the Year of the Horse. The limited release comes in unique packaging that blends the Mexican ikat rebozo pattern with iconography for the Year of the Horse and is available in select retailers nationwide. The company announced another 1942 tie-in, this time celebrating the upcoming FIFA World Cup, in late February. The limited-edition FIFA bottling is inspired by the World Cup trophy and was set at press time to hit shelves in April.
Diageo’s second Hot Brand for 2025 is Crown Royal Chocolate. In its first year, Crown Royal Chocolate reached 300,000 cases. Flavors have been strong for the brand in the last five years, with many releases earning Impact Hot Prospect or Hot Brand honors. “Crown Royal now holds five of the top ten flavored whisky spots in the U.S.,” notes Hadley Schafer, vice president of Crown Royal at Diageo North America. “Flavors make up about half of our total business by volume.”
Heaven Hill’s Lunazul, a 100%-agave Tequila brand, is the second-largest spirits Hot Brand for 2025. The affordably priced brand grew 29.5% to 2.26 million cases last year, continuing its strong run. Since 2022, the brand has tacked on more than 1.3 million cases in the U.S. as Heaven Hill has bolstered the core lineup of blanco, reposado, and añejo with specialty releases and sports partnerships, including a multi-team partnership with the NBA announced in late 2025.
“We’re fortunate to have Tequila Ocho and Lunazul,” said Heaven Hill co-president Kate Latts in a recent interview with Market Watch sister publication Whisky Advocate. “With Tequila, we’re at the start of that growth period; we’re working hard to scale our [Mexican] capacity to meet demand.”
In third by volume is Buffalo Trace, the largest of Sazerac’s three Hot Brand winners. The whiskey—the only Bourbon to earn the award this year—grew 15.5% to 930,000 cases. The brand, more so than Sazerac’s other American whiskeys, has benefited from the company’s distillery expansions over the last half decade, with supply finally beginning to meet consumer demand for the flagship
Bourbon label.
Fireball innovation Blazin’ Apple also earned a Hot Brand award for Sazerac, with the apple cinnamon-flavored whisky reaching 330,000 cases in its first year on the market. The release is the first extension for Fireball, which for years grew entirely based on its core cinnamon flavored SKU. Sazerac is also the owner of the only American vodka to earn a Hot Brand award for 2025 performance with its Wheatley brand. The vodka, named for Buffalo Trace master distiller Harlen Wheatley, grew 15% to 355,000 cases in 2025.
In fourth place is Spirit of Gallo’s Gran Malo, a spicy Tequila-based liqueur. The brand launched in 2024 and caught fire in 2025, rocketing from 80,000 cases to 370,000 last year. The tremendous growth coincided with Gallo expanding the brand into new markets throughout 2025. Starting with its base market of Southern California, Gallo expanded Gran Malo into Arizona, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico, California, and Texas, among others, last year.
Gallo is also the owner of the only soju to earn Hot Brand honors with Soonhari. The brand, capitalizing on the growing interest in Korean culture in the U.S., grew 90% in 2025, 24 reaching 340,000 cases. Soonhari’s 2025 growth is a massive acceleration for the brand, which saw 25% and, 16% growth in the two previous years, respectively. Soonhari comes in nine flavors, ranging from fruits like Apple and Plum to more traditional Korean flavors like Yogurt, and is bottled at 12% abv.
Of the four remaining spirits Hot Brands, two are Tequilas, one is a flavored whiskey, and one is a liqueur. The Tequilas—Constellation Brands’ Mi Campo and Fifth Generation’s Lalo—both exhibited strong growth in 2025. Mi Campo grew more than 50% to 323,000 cases. Lalo, following its acquisition by Tito’s parent company Fifth Generation, grew 42% to 220,000 cases.
The remaining liqueur is Bacardi’s St-Germain, an elderflower liqueur and crucial ingredient in making the Hugo Spritz cocktail. Capitalizing on the increased interest in Spritz cocktails in the U.S., St-Germain grew 43% to 256,000 cases in 2025, earning its first Hot Brand award.
Finally, Brown-Forman notched one Hot Brand this year for Jack Daniel’s Tennessee Blackberry, the latest flavored offering from the giant of American whiskey. In its first year on the market, Blackberry reached 219,000 cases, helping to hedge against the challenges facing the wider Jack Daniel’s brand. The launch of Jack Daniel’s Blackberry helped push Brown-Forman’s global whiskey sales up 1% in the nine months through January and also contributed a marked boost in the U.S. market.
20 RTDs Earn Hot Brands
While full-strength spirits and table wines adjust to the shifting drinks landscape in the U.S., wine- and spirits-based RTDs have met the moment, rising to become the leading growth engine for volume in the U.S. alcohol market. Among this year’s Hot Brand award-winners, 20 wine or spirits-based RTDs made the grade, with volume for the winning brands totaling just under 50 million cases. Of the winners, 14 brands are spirits-based, five are made with wine, and one brand uses both, depending on the release.
The winning RTDs range in size from over 10 million cases for Stateside Brands’ Surfside, the largest winner, down to 350,000 cases for Redtree Beverages’ Minute Maid Spiked, which earned its first honor for its 2025 performance. The majority of the Hot Brand-winning RTDs are canned (or in other individual-sized packaging), with only Suntory Global Spirits’ On The Rocks and Sazerac’s Biggies Buzzballz representing the larger-format ready-to-serve cocktail segment.
With other categories facing headwinds, the industry has doubled down on its commitment to RTDs, with Southern Glazer’s, the U.S.’s largest alcohol distributor, increasing its category buy-in. “We have continued to refine our RTD portfolio with some great recent additions along with some top-ten RTDs we have had the opportunity to build and grow for a number of years now,” says Zach Poelma, senior vice president for commercial intelligence at Southern Glazer’s Wine & Spirits. “Our business is growing double-digits within RTDs and is fueled by our investments in the convenience channel.”
Surfside, the vodka and iced tea-lemonade RTD from Philadelphia’s Stateside Brands, is this year’s largest Hot Brand RTD winner at 10.5 million cases. The brand is the third-largest spirits label in the U.S. overall, behind Spirit of Gallo’s High Noon and Fifth Generation’s Tito’s vodka. Last year, Surfside grew 124.2%, placing it among the strongest growth labels of this year’s crop of Hot Brands.
“Surfside was the No. 1 best-selling spirit-based hard tea and lemonade brand within NIQ for 2025, and it had the No. 1 best performing SKUs in both spirits-based hard tea and lemonade with our variety 8-packs,” says Stateside Brands CEO Clement Pappas. “We had a strong distribution push into national accounts, and the hard work and great partnerships have paid off with strong Surfside
growth performance.”
To spur further growth, Surfside continues to expand its offerings, launching a new blueberry lemonade flavor in February. The new addition is at 4.5% abv and contains 100 calories per 12-ounce can. Surfside Blueberry Lemonade is available in 4-packs of 12-ounce cans ($11). “By continuing to introduce new products that resonate with today’s consumers, we’re able to drive sustained growth and expand our reach nationwide,” says Matt Quigley, Stateside Brands president and co-founder.
Behind Surfside is Anheuser-Busch InBev’s (A-B InBev) Beatbox, the largest of the company’s three Hot Brand winners. Last year, Beatbox grew 30.4% to reach 6.7 million cases, with A-B InBev announcing the purchase of the brand in December. The deal closed at the end of February with the company remarking in a statement, “with the addition of Beatbox, Anheuser-Busch becomes the No. 3 hard beverage supplier in the industry with the fastest-growing hard beverage portfolio in 2026.”
One of the keys to the brand’s success, said co-founder and CEO Justin Fenchel at the Wine & Spirits Wholesalers of America WineForward Access Live event in February, is meeting consumers where and how they want to drink. For Beatbox, he said, that means single-serve Tetra Paks and a heavy focus on promoting the brand at music festivals. Another key, he said, is the brand’s focus on a
huge range of flavors. “You have to think of us much more like an energy drink company or a hydration company with flavors,” he said. “It’s not like we have one SKU or two SKUs that work. They all sell; they need to be together.”
Just behind Beatbox is Cutwater, another A-B InBev brand. In 2025 Cutwater grew 61% to 6.5 million cases on the strength of its portfolio of canned cocktails. One of the originators of spirits-based canned RTDs, Cutwater has grown steadily and continues to be a category stalwart despite burgeoning competition. A-B InBev’s final Hot Brand-winning RTD, Nütrl, offers vodka sodas with fruit flavors at a sessionable abv. The brand grew by 17.5% in 2025, reaching 3.2 million cases and sitting just outside the top five Hot Brands by volume.
SNFood & Beverage’s Carbliss is the fourth-largest Hot Brand RTD winner, seeing 50% growth to 4.2 million cases. The brand, which markets 12 flavors of vodka-based cocktails and two made with Tequila, is still building its national footprint. Carbliss recently announced expansion into New York and Georgia, offering the brand even more runway for future growth. “Strong launches matter,” says co-founder and CEO Adam Kroener. “What matters more is sustainable execution. We don’t enter states casually. We build them with the right partners, the right people, and a long-term mindset.”
Rounding out the top five RTD Hot Brand winners is The Finnish Long Drink, made by The Long Drink Co. The brand grew 22% in 2025, landing at 3.3 million cases by the end of the year. The brand, backed by celebrities like actor Miles Teller and entrepreneur Jay-Z, has seen its popularity explode since 2019, adding nearly a million cases in both 2023 and 2024. “We finally got wide distribution in grocery. Long Drink is a new category, and it took a while to show we have real staying power with customers,” says CEO Evan Burns. “Loyalty scan data from most of our partners show we have some of the highest repurchase rates in alcohol.”
To build on its success, Burns said the company will lean into tastings and promotional offerings. “We are running major on-premise programs like ‘drinks on Long Drink’ where we’ll Venmo people for drinks (or buckets) they get on-premise,” he said. “We are still sub-5% in terms of brand awareness, much less than the other top ten RTD brands, so we think we have the most unrealized upside.”
Outside the top five, there are seven brands above 1 million cases in this year’s class of Hot Brand RTD winners, showing the vitality of the category. Behind A-B’s Nütrl is Boston Beer Co.’s Sun Cruiser vodka and iced tea cocktail. Last year the brand grew exponentially, rocketing from 725,000 cases in 2024 to over 3 million in 2025. It’s followed by Sazerac’s Buzzballz Chillers, the largest of the four Hot Brand-winning Buzzballz variants on this year’s RTD list. The wine-based Chillers
grew 38.5% to 2.05 million cases. Just behind Chillers is Buzzballz Cocktails, the largest spirits-based Buzzballz offshoot. The Cocktails grew 46.5% to 1.33 million cases in the U.S. Sazerac also scored Hot Brand awards for Biggies Buzzballz, a 1.75-liter offering, which grew 50.5% to 1.25 million cases in 2025, and for Buzzballz Chillers Biggies, which grew from 125,000 cases in 2024 to
500,000 in 2025.
Following Buzzballz Cocktails is Spirit of Gallo’s VMC, the company’s Tequila-based sparkling RTD and its first of three Hot Brand RTD winners. VMC grew 96.5% to 1.37 million cases in 2025. Gallo’s second-largest winner, Lucky One Lemonade, is a relative newcomer, having launched in April 2025. The new brand is a collaboration with business personality Dave Portnoy and his dog, Miss Peaches, and the brand has pledged to raise $1 million for rescue dogs in the U.S. In its first year on the market the brand reached 975,000 cases. Finally, Gallo earned a Hot Brand award for Vibe Twisted Sips, a wine-based RTD. Last year the brand grew 31% to 720,000 cases in just its second year on the market.
While the vast majority of Hot Brand-winning RTDs are packaged as single servings, Suntory Global Spirits has found success with its bottled cocktail brand On the Rocks, which also has a growing presence in the canned cocktail space. The brand grew 22% last year to reach 963,000 cases, joining the Hot Brand list. Suntory Global Spirits CEO Greg Hughes attributes the success to innovation.
“The Lemon Drop Martini was one of the more successful innovations we had,” he says. “So we have the bottled cocktails, but have also complemented that with individual cans and four-pack cans as well. You’ll see us expand bottles, but even more aggressively expand on the canned format this year as that’s a strong growth driver in the category.”
Suntory also scored a Hot Brand for -196, globally the largest spirits brand at nearly 35 million cases. In the U.S., however, the brand is a relative newcomer, earning its first Hot Brand award in its third year on the market after more than tripling in 2025 to reach 512,000 cases. “We’ve got a huge innovation pipeline coming this year,” says Hughes. “We’re seeing strong traction on the brand and
the growth rates are triple digits, but off a very small base. We’ve got work to do this year to break out and go beyond an emerging Hot Brand to really start to scale.”
Rounding out this year’s Hot Brand RTD winners are Good Boy vodka’s namesake RTD, which grew 104% to 1.28 million cases; Patco Brands Big Sipz, which reached 725,000 cases on 70.5% growth; Two Chicks Cocktails’
eponymous drinks, up 16.3% to 393,000 cases; and Redtree Beverages Minute Maid Spiked, up 75% to 350,000 cases.
Imports Pace Wine Winners
Amid difficult conditions in the wine market, the Hot Brands wine roster saw nine labels fall from the list compared with the previous year, but there remain a dozen standout brands showing the way forward as the category looks to return to growth. It should be noted that almost all of the brands that fell from the ranks in the past year continued to post positive gains, albeit not of the pace demanded by Hot Brands’ strict criteria. Overall this year’s wine Hot Brands combined for 19% growth to 9.5 million cases, with imports fielding twice as many honorees as domestic wines, despite the U.S. tariff hike on imports last year.
On the domestic side, Delicato Family Wines’ Bota Box Breeze is by far the largest Hot Brand this year The better-for-you brand is closing in on the 1-million-case mark, having roughly doubled in size over the past three years. “Premium boxed wine has always been a very competitive category that has sold well straight off the shelf,” notes Delicato president and CEO Chris Indelicato. “The consumer is very loyal in that category. We’re focused on quality and delivering the value that the consumer is used to getting.”
The second-largest brand on the domestic wines list is Bonanza, the fast-rising California label from the Wagner Family of Wine. Bonanza has nearly doubled in size in the past three years. Last year, Bonanza introduced two new wines, including The Vinekeeper—a new Cabernet that will highlight various California wine regions—and a Chardonnay. Bonanza blew past projections last year, nearing 600,000 cases in the U.S., according to Impact Databank. Also earning a Hot Brand from the domestic side is Silver Gate from The Wine Group, an on-premise-focused label that topped 300,000 cases in 2025, accelerating from the prior year despite the tough conditions.
Deutsch Family Wine & Spirits scored two wine Hot Brands this year, one on the domestic list and one from the import side. California-sourced Josh Cellars Seaswept earned Market Watch Leaders honors for Best New Wine Product last year, and it has now earned its first Hot Brand award after jumping 64% to 320,000 cases in 2025. While Seaswept’s original offering is a blend of Sauvignon Blanc and Pinot Grigio, the lineup is now being extended with Seaswept Sparkling, a California blend of 50% Chenin Blanc and 50% Colombard, with an abv of 12.5%. The new sparkler will be backed by a comprehensive marketing campaign, including new ads running from Memorial Day through Labor Day.
“Seaswept Sparkling delivers everything people want in a beverage for more informal, higher-energy occasions where wine has traditionally not met needs as well as RTDs—crisp, refreshing, shareable, and above all easy to enjoy,” says Deutsch Family CMO Dan Kleinman. The Josh Cellars brand is also represented on the Hot Brands list with its Prosecco offering, which reached 251,000 cases on 14% growth last year.
In addition to Josh Cellars Prosecco, two other sparkling labels earned Hot Brand honors, the first being market leader La Marca from Gallo. Now nearing 3.6 million cases in the U.S., La Marca has managed continued expansion despite the slowing industry, with its marketers extending the brand’s presence in the on-premise and in the wine cocktail segment in recent years. “In this environment, now more than ever, we have to show up for consumers in the moments that matter, in the channels they trust, with relevance that earns their attention,” says Gallo chief commercial officer Britt West. “The Gallo portfolio is large so I want to make sure each brand is doing a specific job. La Marca continues to find ways to celebrate the everyday, and that contributes to wine’s consumer relevancy.” Gallo is also present on the Hot Brands wine list with Whitehaven, the only New Zealand entry on the honor roll this year. Whitehaven has posted consistently strong gains recently and neared 1 million cases in 2025.
Opera Prima, from CIV USA, represents the Spanish sparkling category. The brand crested the half-million-case mark in 2025 and has been on a steep upward climb since 2022, when it was at 276,000 cases. Opera Prima boasts a wide portfolio that includes Charmat method sparklers in traditional Brut and Rosé formats but also flavored offerings like Mimosa, Bellini, Blackberry, Blue Moscato, and others.
Another European import making impressive gains is La Vieille Ferme, from Vineyard Brands. The accessibly priced French label—known for its rooster mascot on the label—has long had strong U.S. traction, particularly behind its rosé offering. Last year La Vieille Ferme picked up speed, jumping 16% and surpassing 800,000 cases in the U.S. market. “La Vieille Ferme offers exceptional value in an environment which has seen California wine prices rise significantly over the past decade and European wine prices rise more recently in response to tariffs,” says Catherine Cutier, senior vice president of marketing and brand strategy at Vineyard Brands. “The shared ambition between the Perrin Family and Vineyard Brands is to maintain La Vieille Ferme’s position as an everyday luxury.”
Also on the import side is the Avaline brand from Cameron Diaz and Katherine Power, which crossed 300,000 cases last year. Since its launch in 2020, the brand has built out a portfolio from various global regions, beginning with red and white blends before developing a line of varietal wines that includes Syrah, Lambrusco, and Sauvignon Blanc, among others. Avaline last year struck a national partnership with Southern Glazer’s. “We’re seeing particularly strong momentum behind our newest launch: a low-sugar Prosecco,” notes Avaline CEO Jennifer Purcell.
In addition to its growth in the wholesale market—where it’s aligned with Southern Glazer’s Wine & Spirits across 32 states—Avaline has been adept at creating a direct connection with consumers through its website. So too has a new Hot Brand entrant, Gratsi, an upscale bag-in-box label. Gratsi, which features, red, white, rosé, and sparkling offerings sourced from France and Italy, doubled in size to 350,000 9-liter cases last year. This year, founder Stephen Vlahos told Impact it’s targeting about 2 million boxes—or about 670,000 case equivalents.
“The wholesale piece is a really big part of the investment in the future of the company,” Vlahos says, noting that last year the wholesale segment accounted for about a third of volume despite the brand only being available in a smattering of East Coast markets that comprise about 6% of the U.S. population. This year, Gratsi is lining up wholesale launches in Massachusetts, New York, Virginia, Michigan, Wisconsin, and other states, markedly adding to its footprint.
While much of the wine world’s attention has been focused on attracting consumers who favor lower-alcohol offerings, one Hot Brand winner—XXL—has taken a contrarian view, with considerable success. Sourced from Moldova and Spain, XXL is imported by Tri-Vin Imports and weighs in at an abv of 16%. The brand comes in an array of flavors like Guava, Blueberry, Pineapple, Mango, and others, selling in both 750-ml. bottles and 500-ml. Tetra Paks. XXL more than doubled in size to cross the half-million-case mark in the U.S. last year, with further expansion expected this year amid continued interest from some consumer segments in higher-alcohol offerings.