The reason why this iconic southern Gold Coast bar is serving cocktails with no alcohol

Booze without the buzz? A popular southern Gold Coast bar has launched a menu of cocktails that taste just like the real thing — minus the alcohol. Find out why.

THERE’S a lot to unpack in a six-pack — and events like Dry July help to start a conversation about our relationship with liquor.

Burleigh Pavilion has launched a new menu of non-alcoholic cocktails called Club Sober, but it’s more than a four-week PR move to support those raising money for the Dry July Foundation.

The beachside bistro is planning to offer the drinks indefinitely after operations manager Lou Edney realised there was a demand for booze without the buzz.

“I was doing some research for my WSET diploma in wine and spirits and I found out 22 per cent of adults don’t drink any alcohol,” Lou says.

“A lot of people don’t drink anymore. Especially living on the Coast, they’re up at sunrise running and exercising.”

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Burleigh Pavilion launches Club Sober, a range of cocktails entirely alcohol free, made from Lyre’s Spirit Co.

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Lou came across Lyre’s Spirit Co, which replicates spirits without the alcohol.

“They create a range of spirits — gin, amaretto, white and dark rum, bourbon — with no alcohol,” Lou says.

“You still get the herbs, the spices and that alcohol flavour as such.”

So why not just drink soft drink or juice at a bar?

Clinton Schultz, director of Gold Coast non-alcoholic beer range Sobah, says the taste of alcohol plays a role in why grown-ups enjoy consuming it.

“You have a more sophisticated palate as you get older,” Clinton says.

“What people are chasing is more sophisticated textures, profiles, flavours than soft drink. “People don’t like being stung $5 for a glass of bubbly water with lime. They don’t like being taken advantage of. They want to pay good money for non-alcoholic drinks.”

Lou says one of her staff members exemplified this during her break from grog.

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Clinton Schultz, founder of Gold Coast non-alcoholic craft beer company Sobah. Photo: Supplied

“Some of them (our staff) are doing Dry July and one of them said ‘I’m really craving a beer’,” Lou says.

“She said ‘I just really like the taste of a nice cold beer. It’s not the way it makes me get drunk. I just don’t want the alcohol’.”

Clinton says there’s a growing movement towards healthier lifestyles across Australia, with an aspect of that including giving up or cutting back on alcohol.

However, these people are often stigmatised by those that are closest to them.

“It’s still very common for people to cop flak from family and friends, you almost get treated like there’s something wrong with you,” Clinton says.

“Particularly, that’s something that I’ve noticed here on the Gold Coast. I think the Gold Coast is quite behind in terms of this trend.

“Sobah is probably in 20 retailers in Sydney CBD, and 15-odd bars in Sydney. It’s nowhere on the Gold Coast.

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The Outdoor Beach Bar at Burleigh Pavilion. Photography: Russell Shakespeare

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“There’s a lot of people that are coming here for a good time. The Gold Coast itself traditionally has a pretty entrenched party scene.

“It’s funny — we’ve got a market, we’ve got a lot of customers here on the Gold Coast that can’t go to a retailer. We’re more finding that it’s the retailers and venues that are hesitant.”

Lou says a low-alcohol option on tap at Burleigh Pavilion before their promotion had already proven a hit: Halo, a four per cent kombucha brew.

“Their marketing campaign is you can go out all night and drink Halo and not wake up with a hangover,” Lou says.

Clinton says it’s up to consumers to put the pressure on watering holes and bottle-os and request non or low-alcoholic products to prove there is a need for it.

“I think it’s going to take consumers to be hassling the retailers and venues,” he says.

“If you tell them we want healthier options, then they have to respond to that.

“That’s what we’re trying to encourage people to do — say I’m one of your consumers and I want this.”