When Stateside Vodka debuted their iced tea- and lemonade-mixed canned cocktails in 2022, the Kensington company had distribution in eight states. Two years later, they’ve gone nationwide.
“Our first day of rolling it out, I brought 10 cases to a vending room,” remembers Jason Firestone, Citizens Bank Park’s senior director of concessions. “We now stock our vending rooms with full pallets.” This explosive growth is entirely due to Surfside. The brand has reshaped Stateside’s portfolio: Surfside constitutes 60% of the company’s sales, while its bubbly counterpart, Stateside Vodka Sodas, makes up another 25%. The straight-up vodka that constituted the company’s bedrock for years now accounts for just 15% of its sales.
“Then it was like, ‘Maybe we should make 40,000 cases,’ and then that was gone. It was like, ‘Alright, we’ll make 80,000,’” Pappas remembers. “We just couldn’t get in front of it all summer.” Stateside projects it will have sold 4.5 million cases of Surfside by the end of 2024, which would make it one of the best-selling spirits-based RTDs in the country. To handle that tremendous volume, it outsources production. Eight co-packers across the country — including in California, Vermont, North Carolina, Arizona, and Wisconsin — blend and package it to the company’s specifications.