Bottled cocktails are having a moment, spurred by coronavirus – and in Asia a Chinese venture is leading the way

Bottled cocktails were a thing already, but lockdowns have seen their popularity grow as mixologists around the world get creative to keep bars going

With the unboxing as important as the drinking, they have got creative with packaging. In China, a new market for at-home cocktails has emerged: women drinkers

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A range of drinks for at-home consumption from Laiba Beverages, a bottled cocktail venture founded in 2017 in Shanghai that recently launched home deliveries in Asian markets and plans to expand into the UK. It has found women, who often say they don’t drink strong alcoholic drinks, are big customers in China for its products.

Published: 12:15pm, 7 Aug 2020Updated: 3:41pm, 4 May 2021

You can’t go to the bar, but bartenders around the world, faced with the harsh realities of Covid-19 lockdowns, are bringing bar-quality bottled cocktails to their customers.

The past few months has seen an increasing number of Hong Kong’s cocktail bars and hotel lounges launch their own bottled cocktail lines, with many offering home delivery. The motivation is twofold: for the bar, these takeaway cocktails are a much-needed source of income, but they also allow the customer to bring the flavours of their favourite bars into their homes.

Joiz Wong, bar operations manager at Bar De Luxe, in the city’s Central business and entertainment district, says they launched their bottled cocktail range in mid-April. “Because of Covid-19, we were not able to open, and we didn’t want to just disappear during closure,” Wong says. “We needed to ensure our customers were still able to enjoy our cocktails even being stuck at home. I’m sure people will be craving cocktails at home when they are not able to go out for drinks.”

Sandeep Kumar, bartender and co-founder of The Wise King, also in Central, tackled the challenges of lockdown by collaborating with friends and fellow bartenders Sandeep Hathiramani, of tea-inspired bar Tell Camellia, and Jay Khan of Mexican-inspired bar COA.

Mixing a cocktail at The Wise King in Hong Kong.

“We couldn’t do anything,” Kumar says. “[The government] asked us to operate only in the daytime. Well, during the daytime we couldn’t run the bar … So that’s why all the bartenders came up with ideas like takeaway bottles.”

Kumar and his collaborators created a limited edition trio of bottled negronis: “washed” (The Wise King), “caffeinated” (COA) and “Darjeeling” (Tell Camellia), each branded with the logo of the respective bar. The Wise King also adapted its signature Mandarino Negroni for bottling, another collaboration using gin produced by local distiller N.I.P.