How hard seltzer came to Sioux Falls — and where to find local ones

Listen closely enough on a quiet, summer day, and you probably can hear the effervescence.

Tiny, boozy bubbles bursting in cans and glasses in barefoot backyards, downtown patios and poolside parties.

The sounds of seltzer.

Hard seltzer stormed onto the drinking scene in the past few years. Vox called it the “unofficial drink of summer 2019.” The trend was fueled largely by the popularity of top brands White Claw and Truly, which, according to Forbes, own a combined 75 percent of the hard seltzer market as of January.

But that’s not stopping local brewers from jumping onto the seltzer scene.

“All of the data suggests seltzers are here to stay,” said Alex Matson, a sales market manager for Fernson Brewing Co.

Fernson’s Skip Day line of seltzers launched in August 2020, and the response has been “overwhelmingly positive,” said Addi Schurrer, another sales market manager.

Skip Day also helped Fernson tap into the competitive craft beer scene in Minneapolis and St. Paul. Twin Cities customers began finding Skip Day near them in early April. It also helped the brewery establish a new revenue stream during the pandemic.

“We wouldn’t have the recent growth we’ve experienced without it,” Matson said of Skip Day.

Severance Brewing Co. also added seltzer to the lineup in its downtown taproom late last summer and was among the first craft breweries to do a sour seltzer with its Fun Hater’s sour seltzer with raspberry.

In some ways, Severance drinkers have the residents of The Cascade apartments above the brewery to thank for its foray into the seltzer scene.

Severance’s taproom abuts the apartment complex’s pool, and last summer, head brewer and CEO Scott Heckel started seeing just how much hard seltzer people were drinking.

“The number of cases of White Claw or the other guys’ seltzer that we saw delivered on a weekly basis” was enough to make him want to get a piece of the action, he said.

Seltzer brewing differs from beer brewing in a couple of key ways. Beer starts with a combination of grains, but with seltzer, it’s just sugar and water.

Brewers also add nutrients to the water to ensure that the yeast, which turns the sugar into alcohol, has enough to eat. The sugar ferments out, leaving just a few carbs behind.

The sugar-free, low-carb nature of seltzer is also a big part of its popularity, brewers said. Another attractive trait is that seltzers are gluten-free.

“People are looking for beverages that are providing them with what they want in an alcoholic beverage without all the calories,” said Tom Slattery, owner of JJ’s Wine, Spirits & Cigars, which also has seen increased demand for hard seltzers in recent years.

Seltzer brewing also differs from beer brewing in its speed.

A typical lager at Fernson takes about six to seven weeks to produce, Matson said. A seltzer brews in just two to three days.

Hard seltzers can be fickle, though. When it comes to taste, it’s hard to get right.

“You just can’t screw anything up,” Schurrer said, or the flavor gets really bad really quickly.

Both Fernson and Severance said it took several rounds of trial and error before they came up with a recipe that made a palatable hard seltzer.

But when it works, it works well. Heckel said the raspberry sour seltzer holds its own against other beers from a sales standpoint, and it’s often outselling the pear cider, another sweet and light option the brewery has on tap.

Fernson’s Skip Day also has been picked up by other local breweries and taprooms. It’s on tap at Monks Ale House and WoodGrain Brewing Co., and it’s also available at Remedy Brewing Co. In addition, customers can find it in cans at retailers, including variety packs, which are put together by hand by the Fernson team.

Severance recently launched a pineapple and roasted coconut hard seltzer, and both it and the raspberry version are available on tap and in crowlers to go.

Heckel said canning might be in the future for Severance’s hard seltzer too, and he hopes to keep it on tap.

“I would assume that will almost always be on rotation,” he said.