Momentum Moment: “Cocktails To Go”

By Mike Berland
May 7, 2020



When you can’t go to the bar, restaurants innovate to bring the bar to you.
Will “cocktails to go” have lasting momentum?

Not too long ago, it was only in the Big Easy where you could grab a supersized hurricane on the street & get tipsy while you hopped from the Spotted Cat on Frenchmen Street to the Carousel Bar in the Hotel Monteleone. 

Usually, there’s no momentum for alcohol or “cocktails to go” - the majority of states in the US haven’t allowed it. But as U.S. governors forbade restaurants from allowing customers to dine in en masse, state legislatures innovated quickly & changed laws to allow establishments to serve “cocktails to go”. 

As Americans in the cities get out to enjoy May’s great weather, one of the emerging momentum makers is “cocktails to go”. You know, those great cocktails that you “pick up” outside of your favorite bars and restaurants and enjoy while you social distance. Emphasis on social.

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To keep up the momentum, here’s how “cocktails to go” need to hit all 5 drivers of momentum:

  • DISRUPTION: Allowing us to socialize while being social.

  • INNOVATION: Benefits of the bar/restaurant experience in a cup. Restaurants will need to continuously experiment with what “cocktails to go” can be to keep interest. Burden is on them to create mixology culture “to go”. What new and interesting experiences can restaurants provide to take out consumers? Can “make your own” baskets or virtual cocktail making lessons to create a more holistic experience be far behind?

  • POLARIZATION: Not everyone agrees cocktails to go should continue on past this time. That’s ok, the discussion and debate around legalizing “cocktails to go” is healthy and may even motivate those in favor to fight harder.

  • STICKY: “Cocktails to go” means we’re making more quarantine memories.

For now, we’ll keep enjoying “cocktails to go” as long as it lasts.

What is MFactor?

The MFactor is our proprietary algorithm that quantifies Cultural Momentum. The MFactor is a single score that is based on the Newtonian definition of Mass times Velocity. The MFactor can be tracked over time to compare anything you google:

  • People of interest (any political candidates/politicians, celebrities, artists, etc.)

  • Political issues / movements / trends

  • Brand/Product (e.g. across any industry or subcategory)

Our data has consistently been ahead of trends. Why?

We go beyond traditional methods (social media analytics, polling, etc.) by using data science algorithms to compute new metrics that reflect polarization and how “sticky” the issue is — how much people want to talk about and debate it and how emotionally invested they are in their position (velocity) — which is how things work in the real world.

kate strassman