The first whiff we get when we open the cork to Svami’s new offering, the rum and cola, is of Old Monk. We take a sip, and it tastes exactly like it would if you mixed up the legendary rum brand with some fizzy dark cola. The gin and tonic, on the other hand, is pink and perfectly pretty. The aroma and taste of a G&T is intact, and that’s surprising because neither of the drinks are spiked. The chic label says, it’s “zero proof”, which means, no alcohol.

Svami co-founders Aneesh Bhasin, Rahul Mehra and Sahil Jatana

“It’s a global trend these days. Even brands like Budweiser have non-alcoholic versions. Research has shown that Generation Z is drinking less alcohol, but wants a beverage option. When we started Svami, the aim was not to be a tonic water company, but a beverage label, so this was always in the plan—to create complex and good-tasting drinks,” says Aneesh Bhasin, co-founder. He shares that it took close to 15 tastings by the team to zero in on the final product, and they even held a blind tasting at an event for bartenders. “They all said, yeah, that’s rum and cola. But when they learnt, it had no rum, they wanted to know how we had managed the taste. But, that’s a secret!”

And even though they now have cola ready, they admit they don’t have the bandwidth to fight the big brands. The team that is retailing the beverages through their website for now, is also focusing on being as sustainable as possible. Bhasin says, “We are moving to zero plastic soon, even in packaging. We had paper cups last year, and realised that the inner lining was plastic, so we dumped those. Even our shipping boxes will be zero-plastic soon.”

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