What is an alcopop?
The term is a combination of ‘alcohol’ and ‘pop’ in the sense of fizzy drink. (See Michael Quinion’s short piece on the word.) Beer fanciers might describe any remotely palatable alcoholic drink as an alcopop, and there are certainly no absolute criteria. Nonetheless, the classic alcopops can be considered alcoholic versions of soft drinks, even if the non-alcoholic versions don’t exist. Hence good indicators of alcopopularity are fizziness, artificial colouring, sweetness and sale by the (330 ml beer-top) bottle. More formal names for alcopops are ‘pre-mixed spirits’, ‘alcoholic carbonates’ and alcoholic ‘ready-to-drinks’ (RTDs), while ‘designer drinks’ was once a fashionable term that can include non-alcoholic ‘energy drinks’. (Note, however, that the Portman Group’s code of practice prohibits the advertising of drinks as ‘energising’ or ‘stimulating’ on the justifiable grounds that alcohol is a depressant. It similarly enjoins brewers not to market their drinks at young people, so w
