Hoste Cocktails is building the high-end RTS (ready to serve) category
It's expensive, but actually not?
Most founders in bev/alc obsess over liquid, and brand, and distribution, yada yada yada. Fewer obsess over the occasion — but maybe they should.
Jordan Tepper and his team at Hoste (pronounced “Host,” but I kept saying “Ha-ste” in our interview. Sorry about that) are doing both. Their “bottled cocktails” aren’t RTDs (they’re quick to remind you they’re ready to serve, not ready to drink), and they are actually tapping into hosting culture. As in, hosting parties.
We really do need more parties, so I’m into it.
Hosting can be stressful, enter HOSTE
If you’ve ever thrown a party, you know the pain points. You either:
Bartend all night
Let guests fend for themselves
Hire a bartender
Or serve canned drinks no one’s excited about.
…ew! Not into those options.
As Jordan says: “We branded as Hoste because we wanted to enable people to entertain and host with the most. One of the challenging things about hosting when it comes to cocktails is you have a lot of imperfect solutions.”
Hoste’s answer is a 750ml bottle of bar-quality cocktail: ten pours, perfectly balanced, shelf-stable, and complete with an atomizer garnish that delivers the hit of citrus oil you’d normally get from an orange peel.
I’m going to harp on the atomizer for a minute.
When Jordan told me about it, I thought it sounded silly. Then I tried their flagship Gold Fashioned (they sent me one — yes, anyone can send me drinks, I will try them).
It was decadent and the atomizer was actually awesome. I’ve honestly never experienced anything like it. Apparently, people want the atomizer by itself. That’s a whole other business. Well….
The brand world
The name is the occasion: Hoste. (ONCE AGAIN, PRONOUNCED HOST). The point is to make you a better host.
Packaging matters, and we find this packaging particularly beautiful. They do collaborations with local artists. The box has lovely raised textures.
But the story isn’t about them. The story is about you, the host.
Trojan horse gifting
No one goes shopping for “best bottled cocktail.” But they do buy gifts. Hoste leans into that with beautiful artist-collab packaging, tactile textures, hidden iconography, all the things people will go pretttyyy to when you give it to them as a present.
This is really gifting-first design. The point is to make you a better host.
And gifting drives trial. Two customer archetypes emerge:
The power gifter (always buying Hoste for others, building a feedback loop of discovery), and
The for-me-every-drop loyalist (who orders again and again once they’ve tasted it. This would be my husband. Don’t tell him I said that.)
This is clever: instead of trying to fight for search behavior that doesn’t exist (“best RTS cocktail”), Hoste piggybacks on a universal one: gifting.
The back door strategy
Hoste isn’t playing the same game as RTDs. They’re not trying to win the “better canned cocktail” contest. They’re building a different category lens entirely.
“How many high-end wineries and whiskey brands are there? Now, how many high-end cocktail companies are there? Right now, there’s one.”
Jordan sees bottled cocktails evolving like wine or whiskey, where multiple high-end producers will emerge. But for now, it’s basically Hoste alone at the top.
Their goal is clear: to be the bottled cocktail company of record.
Instead of competing at the shelf, they’re competing in the occasion. The name is the occasion: Hoste. (ONCE AGAIN, PRONOUNCED HOST). It’s what you bring when you want to be a better host. Or when you want to offer someone else the opportunity to be a great host. It's so fun.
Legacy players fight on design, price, and taste. Hoste shifts the axis: occasion + ritual. That’s a more defensible space. If they hold it, they don’t just win share; they grow the category.
They’re using quality as arbitrage
In case you weren’t familiar with the 3-tier system: buyers buy from distributers, and there are millions of markups. Hoste buys direct from producers. That arbitrage lets them use super duper high quality liquid inputs, like a 9-year Kentucky bourbon finished in sherry casks, an ensemble mezcal build with long-maturing agave varieties, Apologue’s in-house bitters. This stuff, Jordan explains, could never be profitable in a bar setting.
“If a bar used our inputs, it would be a $50 cocktail,” he says. At home, it lands at $8 a pour. That’s the anchor: not shelf pricing, but occasion pricing.
This is where Hoste actually blows the mind. $80 does sure sound like a lot for a bottle of anything, but when you think about getting a very high-end Mezcal Negroni or Perfect Manhattan for $8, it makes sense. This way, you get to serve your guests (or in my case, myself) something excellent without paying THAT much.
Depth before width
A lot of young brands try to go national fast. I feel like this is the biggest “mistake” I hear from founders. They grew too fast before they had the marketing or sales resources to support that growth. Hoste is not doing that. They’re building real velocity in Chicago: Binny’s, Whole Foods, independent shops. They’re shipping DTC to 46 states (and the economics actually work at $80–$150 per bottle), but the focus is Chicagoland until the data says expand.
How are sales? You can be sure I asked!
Interestingly, a huge chunk of demand is coming from suburban and rural markets – places without cocktail bars on every corner. Which makes sense. If you live in the city and have Death & Co or The Violet Hour down the block (and a lot of expendable income), maybe you don’t need Hoste. If you live 40 minutes outside of town, maybe you do.
What you can steal
Name the job. Consumers don’t search “RTS cocktail.” They search for ways to host better.
Spend where the drinker can taste it. Cut intermediaries, reinvest into liquid.
Make it extra fancy. The atomizer turns a pour into a performance.
Let gifting be a thing. Trojan horse your way into households.
Go deep, not wide. This overused statement is actually very important. Prove velocity before chasing distribution points.
Simplify your story. Consumers want “tastes amazing, easy to serve.” The geekery is bonus – do not stress people out with so many details. They do not care.
Hot take to end: this category is going to crowd up fast.
Everyone from RTD startups to legacy spirits will chase “bottled cocktails.” Most will fail. The only way to stay ahead is to keep the ritual special and the liquid undeniable. Hoste’s advantage is they’ve started with both. Being of the first is also a big deal.
We’re rooting for you, Hoste. Please send us more cocktails. <3 <3
A+++ analysis, Snaxshot caliber.
how do i send you drinks?
would love for you to check out Groovewagon’s stuff, as we too started from occasion-to-design fit (which makes sense since Emilee Dover* is our Creative Lead)
*if that doesn’t ring a bell, Emilee worked on the Wayback Hotel in Pigeon Forge that won Time Magazine’s “World’s Greatest Places” nod in 2024
So with you on the gifting and not chasing national first (applies to the U.K. where i am), get big in your patch then expand.
And making it gifting first is a smart way to go, it’s also a major driver for online purchases, not many lean into this enough.