Skip to Main Content
HBS Home
  • About
  • Academic Programs
  • Alumni
  • Faculty & Research
  • Baker Library
  • Giving
  • Harvard Business Review
  • Initiatives
  • News
  • Recruit
  • Map / Directions
Faculty & Research
  • Faculty
  • Research
  • Featured Topics
  • Academic Units
  • …→
  • Harvard Business School→
  • Faculty & Research→
Publications
Publications
  • January 2022
  • Teaching Note
  • HBS Case Collection

White Claw: Defending Market Share as Competition Encroaches

By: Jill Avery
  • Format:Print
  • | Language:English
  • | Pages:26
ShareBar

Abstract

By the end of 2019, two brands accounted for 84% of hard seltzer sales, a segment that had recently taken the U.S. beer market by storm, growing from $3 million in 2015 to over $2.7 billion by the start of the summer of 2020. White Claw was the dominant market leader with a 58% market share. This made competition in the segment increasingly fierce. Analysts were worried about fragmentation and commoditization in the category, which had grown from 10 brands in 2018 to more than 65 by 2020. How could White Claw best drive the category’s transition from niche to mainstream and how could it hold onto to and/or expand its market share as the category exponentially grew? White Claw was quickly becoming the “Kleenex” of hard seltzer, so the team need to further differentiate itself from encroaching competitors. Should the team narrow the currently broad target market as competitors launched increasingly microtargeted offerings? Should they lower price as generic hard seltzers hit the market? And, how could the team best manage the White Claw brand to mitigate their chances of riding a boom-to-bust lifecycle of a fad product?

Keywords

Brand Management; Competition; Growth Strategy; First-mover Advantage; Marketing; Marketing Strategy; Brands and Branding; Competitive Strategy; Consumer Products Industry; Food and Beverage Industry; United States; North America

Citation

Avery, Jill. "White Claw: Defending Market Share as Competition Encroaches." Harvard Business School Teaching Note 522-064, January 2022.

About The Author

Jill J. Avery

Marketing
→More Publications

More from the Author

    • April 2022
    • Faculty Research

    Christie's and Leonardo da Vinci's Salvator Mundi: The Value of a Brand

    By: Jill Avery
    • March 2022
    • Faculty Research

    Camera IQ and the Metaverse: Building Augmented Reality Brand Experiences

    By: Jill Avery
    • March 2022
    • Faculty Research

    Supreme: Remaining Cool While Pursuing Growth

    By: Jill Avery and Sandrine Crener
More from the Author
  • Christie's and Leonardo da Vinci's Salvator Mundi: The Value of a Brand By: Jill Avery
  • Camera IQ and the Metaverse: Building Augmented Reality Brand Experiences By: Jill Avery
  • Supreme: Remaining Cool While Pursuing Growth By: Jill Avery and Sandrine Crener
ǁ
Campus Map
Harvard Business School
Soldiers Field
Boston, MA 02163
→Map & Directions
→More Contact Information
  • Make a Gift
  • Site Map
  • Jobs
  • Harvard University
  • Trademarks
  • Policies
  • Accessibility
  • Digital Accessibility
Copyright © President & Fellows of Harvard College