Millennials are Drinking More at Home - Three Reasons Why
You’ve probably seen the headlines:
Millennials are Drinking More at Home Because They Are Lazy
Lazy Millennials Avoid Going to Bars Because it Takes Too Much Effort
Just the latest in the never-ending series of blame the millennial generation for the world’s demise.
There has been generational competition since probably the beginning of human existence. Baby Boomers versus Gen X or Gen X versus Millennials, or Baby Boomers versus Millennials. There will always be a rivalry where one is touted as being the beacon of perfection and the other responsible for society’s decay.
But that mentality is really just an easy way for people to conceptualize change and their typical resistance to it. Of course my way is better than yours because I am older and wiser and don’t like some of the new things you are doing.
The simple reality is that all generations offer value, including millennials. So when people tell me millennials are drinking more at home because they are lazy, I say (in the words of a boomer), “I will not stand for this aggression, MAN!”
The fact is there are several really good reasons why millennials are drinking more at home. None of which involve them being lazy, and all of them actually are pretty smart, to tell you the truth.
DUI’s Destroy Lives
The effects of drunk driving have been well documented. Innocent lives are snatched away much too soon by drunk drivers on a daily basis.
Driving under the influence is a serious problem with serious consequences for both the driver and everyone who may be on the road at the same time as him/her. I am familiar with both sides of the equation.
I have known people who have been taken too soon by a drunk driver and I have known people who have been arrested for drunken driving who very fortunately did not injure anyone.
The impact on family and friends of the loss of a loved one to a drunk driver are indescribable and heart wrenching.
For the offender, the impact of a DUI arrest can be up to $10,000 and loss of your license for an extended period of time, which in many cases can equal loss of a job, especially if a driver’s license is required for the job, which it is for a lot of them.
Then your new job search becomes complicated with a DUI arrest and conviction on your record. It’s a downward spiral, which you don’t want to go down which is why it is smarter to do what millennials are doing…drinking at home!
What happens when you go to a bar? The majority of people who go into a bar (that I know) go to drink alcoholic beverages and that same majority of people also drive themselves there.
With previous generations, in the 1960’s and 1970’s, there were virtually no rules related to driving while intoxicated. The majority of attention and legislation occurred during the early millennial generation in the 1980’s. Consequently, we have all grown up watching the destruction that it can wreak and also internalizing its consequences.
Further, it’s hard enough now to get a job as a millennial, even with an impeccably clean record and 4.0 GPA from a top university. Who the hell wants a DUI hanging over their head when their job prospects are already bleak?
If you are able to socialize and hang out with friends at your house or apartment without endangering someone else’s life, I am going to say you are smart versus lazy just about every single time.
If you want to flip the script and go out to those bars, do it the millennial way and Uber or Lyft it!
Make your own booze
Millennials are also staying home more because they are making their own spirits. I myself fall into this category. I am a homebrewer of beer and wine using kits that I buy from my local beer/wine supply store.
Other millennials have figured out how easy this is to do and how cost effective it can be. Would you rather go spend $50-100 at a bar or enjoy homemade IPA’s or Pinot Noir with your friends at home and spend virtually next to nothing? Well not exactly nothing…we will get into that in a bit, but you will spend significantly less than at that bar.
Baby Boomers look at us Millennials and literally thinks we are some hippie wizard folks when we tell them that we make our own beer and wine.
I certainly understand their shock since most people aren’t accustomed to hearing this but once I explain the process, how easy and cost effective it is, and let them sample the goods, people become excited and want to try it themselves.
If you are interested in joining the hobby, you can always buy a beer or wine starter kit online. There are websites like www.midwestsupplies.com or www.northernbrewer.com that sell 5-6 gallon starter kits that have virtually everything you need to begin.
Or better yet visit your local beer/wine store (if available) and they usually have similar starter kits. Shop local kids! https://www.homebrewersassociation.org/how-to-brew/find-a-homebrew-supply-shop/
These kits will have all of the physical equipment that you need to begin and also have a starter DVD or link to an instructional video where all you do is follow the steps.
Starter kits for beer and wine (the equipment needed to make the beer and wine) tend to run around $100 or so and some of these also include an actual beer kit (which includes ingredients needed for the beer itself). Now I know what you are saying, $100 bucks is a lot of money - I thought you said this was cost effective!
Let me show you how it works. After you purchase a beer making starter set (around $100 for 5 gallon kit), you purchase a type of beer kit that you like to drink, could be IPA, wheat, porter, etc.
That kit will run anywhere from $20 on up but the beauty of these kits is that each batch will yield about 55-60 beers. So for your very first batch of beer, the cost per beer is around $2/beer ($100 starter set + $20 beer kit/60 beers).
That $2 cost per beer is still less than what you would pay in a bar but here is where the magic happens.
With your first batch we factored in the entire cost of your starter set. For that next batch of beer, you are probably only going to pay around $30 for a different type of beer kit. You’ve already got the beer making equipment and “paid” for it with batch one.
With the new $30 beer kit, you’ll yield 60 beers from that at a cost of 50 cents per beer. Now we are talking! At 50 cents for a craft beer that tastes better than what you would get at a bar and the pride factor that comes with its creation. And now it’s even cheaper than what you can buy in a discount liquor store.
It is no wonder that millennials are staying home and drinking. They can have better tasting/customized drinking options at their fingertips without leaving their home at a fraction of the cost.
The wine making kits are similarly cost effective. The starter sets run in the $100 range (all the equipment) and you can pick up an actual wine kit (the ingredients for the wine) starting at $50 and really go as high as you want in price.
You get around 30 bottles of wine per kit so you can get great tasting wine for under $2 a bottle. No you are not crushing grapes yourself like Keanu Reeves in that horribly sappy movie.
Lucky for you, the kit involves the juice being sent to you. You add the necessary ingredients and monitor the results.
A few disclaimers with making beer and wine. These kits involve 5-6 gallon jugs/containers that the alcohol will be made in. You’ll need to keep these at room temperature in your home. So if you have rambunctious children or pets this may not be a great option for you unless you are able to keep the jugs locked away in a pantry or closet. The jugs will be sealed but if someone/something knocks it over, you’ve got 5 gallons of booze on your floor. I love my two dogs but I’ve learned this the hard way.
Beer or wine also takes around 4-6 weeks to make so you will need to have some patience. When you start making more batches, you can stagger this so you can have a fresh batch every 2-3 weeks if you want. With my family being casual drinkers, I have found that the 4-6 weeks wait isn’t really an issue.
You won’t be a pro on the first batch but you will get better with each one you do. The hardest part is getting over the mental hurdle of beginning the process. It seems overwhelming before starting but once you’ve begun and if you follow instructions, your first batch will turn out fine and you will be hooked on a new hobby that your friends will love. Voila and bottoms up!
My goal when I started making beer and wine was to always have alcohol available for when friends or family came over. I would always get frustrated at having to frantically run to the liquor store and pick up things last minute right before we would have company.
I’ve also found that homemade beer and wine are great gifts and additions to dinner parties or gatherings. For me, the cost effectiveness also was also a major reason. I would add up what I would spend on alcohol in a month (for me, my wife, for friends, etc) and run that by what a batch of wine for example would be, and the homemade batch of wine always comes out ahead.
Money…
The final and most obvious reason that millennials drink more at home versus bars is that they understand the financial impact.
Take my wife for example, a fellow millennial, who has over $100,000 in student loan debt thanks to a nursing degree and also an undergraduate degree. Her payments are around $1,000 a month and we both had to work just to get them down that low (they used to be around $2,000 a month).
Many millennials are in the same boat. With the cost of apartments/mortgages and student loan payments, and maybe throw in a car payment, frankly there isn’t a lot of extra money laying around in most cases. This forces us to adapt and really focus on where to spend that finite supply of disposable income.
Oh yeah, and of course those pesky Baby Boomers still haven’t retired. What could they possibly be expected to do with their time aside from acquiring endless piles of money and destroying the environment? Crap…I’m starting to sound like a winy Baby Boomer.
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The world has changed and millennials have adapted to today’s realities. Millennials are over burdened with debt and are struggling to recover from the last recession, in which many of them began their careers underemployed or had just graduated high school/college and could not find work but still had to pay their bills.
Rather than throw out the easy “lazy millennials” and play the blame game, simply recognize that there is more to the millennial’s innovative approach than meet’s the eye. Maybe think of copying certain aspects of it and making your own booze is a great place to start.
And remember, who needs sunshine when there’s…moonshine!