Launching just in time for the weekend is a brightly colored canned vodka and soda beverage that proudly displays who it’s for, instead of backing off from support for the LGBTQ+ community as other companies have done in recent months. In other words, where Bud Light has buckled under pressure as bigotry grows against the LGBTQ+ community,

“The key issue that Bud Light tapped into was the fact that they didn’t understand their core audience and know enough about them,” Hoddeson, a gay man, said about the controversy that began when the Anheuser-Busch beer brand sent influencer Dylan Mulvaney a can of beer. “They just went silent and I think in 2023, you have to be communicating because people communicate themselves if they’re not hearing from you.”

Gay Water, however, is out and proud. The canned cocktail is named after a colloquialism given to the popular mixed drink (vodka and soda) ordered at bars by the gay community. It’s also one of the few openly queer-owned alcohol brands, which Hoddeson said sparked him to create because he wanted more representation in the category.

This new beverage is creating a brand that creates representation, particularly in spaces where representation is lacking such as liquor stores, bars, restaurants and grocery stores. Putting a product with the word GAY in the title is representation itself which they hope reclaims the word from the negativity it’s sometimes associated with it.

Queer designers created the colorful packaging, which pulls inspiration from ’90s Nickelodeon shows and pop art. Gay is an umbrella term and the idea behind the brand is to be as inclusive as possible, “which means we want allies, we want straight people to be part of this community we’re building.”

For now, Gay Water is sold largely online (with a few retailers) and comes in four sugar-free flavors — watermelon, lime, peach and grapefruit — at launch. Six-packs with a single flavor cost $18.25 and 12-packs with a variety of flavors cost $36.50.

Sales of premixed cocktails including surged about 36% last year, making it a $2.2 billion industry according to figures from Distilled Spirits Council of the United States.

Gay Water might not have the deep pockets compared to its competitors, like White Claw, but even at small scale, companies of many sizes are having success making spirit-based seltzers and premixed cocktails.

There’s lots of space in the spirit-based seltzer category in which Gay Water can play, especially if the brand can offer a cultural or emotional connection that will feel more exciting than the prospect of another pineapple-flavored vodka seltzer from national or international corporations,. It’s a top-heavy category where niches can be carved out in similar fashion to craft beer.

Of course, other drinks use the word “gay,” too, including Gay Beer and So Gay Rosé, Hoddeson noted, which are also trying to reach the queer community and offer them an alternative in the straight-dominated space.

There’s a lot of “straight-coded brands that try to acquire the audience and that’s what Bud Light did. There’s clearly a desire for folks to have queer customers they just don’t know the right way to go about it.