Monster and CANarchy Unleash Alcoholic Beverage 'The Beast' At NACS

Earlier this year, Monster Beverages announced it would acquire CANarchy Craft Brewery Collective, whose holdings include the Cigar City, Oskar Blues, Deep Ellum, Perrin Brewing, Squatters, and Wasatch brands. Monster’s $330 million cash purchase of CANarchy was intended to serve as a beachhead for expansion into the alcoholic beverage market.

Last month, Monster gave more details about its forthcoming flavored malt beverage range, “The Beast Unleashed,” in a quarterly report. The Beast Unleashed will come in four flavors and will be 6% Alcohol By Volume (ABV), with a release in late 2022. But at the National Association of Convenience Stores (NACS) trade show, CANarchy let its beast loose onto the world, giving everyone a first look at the monstrosity that will soon lurk inside coolers.

The Beast Unleashed will be available in 16oz single-serve cans and 12oz packs in Mean Green, Scary Berries, White Haze, and Peach Perfect. The can labels cranks up the monster-ness with a more aggressive and beastly design that features a single menacing eye with a Monster claw logo in the middle. The label uses typography reminiscent of horror movie posters, and the cans have a sort of campiness common to the film genre.

Of course, “The Beast Unleashed” might not be the best name for an alcoholic RTD. Alcohol can turn many people into aggressive and abusive monsters, a kind of beast that should maybe stay caged up. It’s unlikely Monster intended to encourage us, or worse, young people, to get angry drunk, but it’s not exactly a stretch to interpret the branding that way.

There is no word, however, on whether The Beast Unleashed will also contain caffeine. Since 2010, the FDA has considered caffeine an unsafe additive to alcoholic beverages after products like Four Loko kept putting kids in the hospital.