Laura Willoughby MBE
Club Soda
The Challenges and Opportunities for lo and no drinks
Speaker and Judge 2019
About Laura Willoughby MBE
Laura Willoughby MBE is co-founder of Club Soda, the Mindful Drinking Movement. Their aim is to create a world where nobody feels out of place for not drinking. Club Soda has individuals, drinks brands, and social spaces in its membership.
The inspiration for Club Soda comes Laura’s experience of giving up drinking seven years ago. A campaigner at heart with a background in movement building and politics, she realised that one of the big sticking points was a way to support people to take a self-guided journey to change their drinking.
Club Soda has over 35,000 individual members, have built a venue listing guide for mindful drinkers (clubsodaguide.com) and they run the UK’s only Mindful Drinking Festival - the next one is on January 18th /19th at Truman Brewery, Brick Lane. Their book, How to be a Mindful Drinker is out on December 26th
There is a growth in sales of lo and no alcohol drinks being driven by consumers of all ages developing a healthier relationship with alcohol. This includes a growing number of people going alcohol-free and 8.6m people moderating their drinking. There are a new wave of low and no alcohol drinks to serve this new market. Laura Willoughby touches on the opportunities and the challenges this new market presents, for producers, venues and the hospitality industry.
