Gen Z is drinking less at concerts | Hacker News Reader

Gen Z is drinking less at concerts

consequence.net

28 pointsshsachdev45 comments

I noticed there was no mention of prices in the article. I would love to see what a festival Budweiser (generic, accessible beer, not a holy war argument) cost say 4 years ago vs today. Venue offerings have always been atrociously priced, and given the stiff rising prices on most consumer goods in the past few years, I could believe that many are choosing to abstain for simple economics.

I paid 14 at 1 festival for a vodka seltzer, and 18 at another for an IPA in the last month.

The fewer people buy the more venues will be tempted to raise the prices, also.

The more people buy the more venues will be tempted to raise the prices, also.

If people buy the usual amount the more venues will be tempted to raise the prices, also.

Ah, the "whale" strategy where you find one guy and sell him one drink for ten thousand dollars.

I believe this is what people mean by bottle service.

Exactly- almost all these articles abstain from mentioning economics.

The fact they don't mention it is the elephant in the room, it really shows the distorted incentives of the outlets publishing this guff.

Has anyone collected all these together?

Would love a data vis to show the amount of words these collectively give to the economic situation.

My own observations are that the wholesale price of beer in UK has not really risen much in the past 30 years. I was paying £24 for a 24 pack in the 90's and basically I still pay the same today.

Personally I find it difficult to justify paying something between 5 & 10 times the retail cost when I go to an event.

To me, all of these articles might just as well say, young people can't afford nice things anymore, but we're going to say that's a personal choice.

They cant afford to go to concerts, pubs and restaurants because they spend all their money on a Netflix subscription.

I'm in the demographic they're doing this study on - based in the UK where drinking culture far exceeds the like of most Western nations - and go to gigs at least once a week.

If the option to have 5 or 6 pints was there, most of my demographic would take it. Drinks are just too expensive though; people get buzzed by other means. Most of the people I meet and go to concerts with consume Ketamine. It gives the same feeling as alcohol in small doses, and might cost £10 for a night while leaving you with no hangover. MDMA and Cannabis is just as prolific, depending on the genre of music. The alternative is that everyone sneaks in hip flasks of cheap spirit, and buys mixers inside which cost a fraction of the price.

This study would have been better done by measure the sobriety of those at the concert, rather than drinks sold by the bar. I think it would tell a very different story.

How are movie prices where you live? Where I am in Africa they have more than doubled in the last 4 years.

I can easily believe that both concert tickets and the drinks they sell have done the same.

I went to Austin City Limits in 2018 and 2022, and in that period I noticed one major change - there was a marked difference in the number of younger folks drinking Liquid Death as a social signifier that they were on something else (mushrooms, mdma, lsd, weed, etc).

In the past few years it's become much more socially acceptable to take alternative substances, and it's probably not a coincidence that a "cool" repackaging of water has taken off as one means of indicating that choice.

That's probably driving more of this trend than just kids not drinking but remaining sober. Alcohol has real competition now... but venues can't sell 2cb.

> I noticed one major change - there was a marked difference in the number of younger folks drinking Liquid Death as a social signifier that they were on something else (mushrooms, mdma, lsd, weed, etc).

So, they told you? You surveyed a statistically significant sample? Otherwise I can't see how this is anything other than speculation or projection.

I recently gave up drinking, and while I am starting to introduce mushrooms into my life, I would very happily be drinking an over-priced Liquid Death at a concert over a, undoubtedly equally or more over-priced beer.

I have surveyed a statistically significant sample of articles, peer reviewed studies and anecdotes.

"I noticed" is a signifier that the following information is the experience of the author (p-value <0.000231) as outlined in the observations that follow.

Pre-print available on request.

I love going to shows, and I love a drink, and yet I've never had any idea how normal people can drink at shows. Like, shows last for hours - I want to keep my energy up through the whole thing, which is not going to happen if I drink, and the last thing I want to do is need to go to some god-awful bathroom during a set. I'll gladly meet you at a bar to chat and have a drink, but if we're gonna rock or even catch some jazz, it's probably going to be sober for me.

(Edit: perhaps because shows used to be cheaper, people would just go see whoever and get trashed?)

People have different reactions to alcohol -- some might get very tired after just one drink, some get more energy with every drink they take until they suddenly crash. Also when you're at a show and you're dancing or jumping around and sweating, you find you need far fewer bathroom trips.

Given the overall trend of blaming Gen Z for everything, the title could as well read "Zoomers are causing event industry sales to plummet".

It amazes me the lengths older generations will go to convince themselves the problems of this world are somehow the fault of their progeny when these poor kids are only just becoming adults. It is such a common, boring trope these days. Honestly, do older people really believe this nonsense? I am genuinely curious because it is so often I see these types of articles and someone has to be paying for them.

So what, we smoke less as well. We've seen enough of harm already, single parents raising kids born out of such trysts, cancer riddled old people. Enough to educate the next generation & not so something just coz it's cool

Less sex also. More obesity and mental illness.

I mean less forcing yourself onto others & coming to talk to therapist instead of internalizing. So no probs there. Obesity is again something that depends on which country you pick for these surveys

> I mean less forcing yourself onto others & coming to talk to therapist instead of internalizing.

Equating sex to “forcing yourself onto others” and indicating that there’s less internalizing going on in the same sentence is pretty wild.

Not all sex, just implying that a portion of the total sex being had from 1) people forcing themselves to do it even though they didn’t want to and 2) people forcing others to do it even though they didn’t want to - and that because of the current environment around consent and queerness, there is less sex overall, because people are having less of the bad sex.

A marketing demographic having less sex does not equate to them being less rapey. It just means they're having less sex.

But why are they having less sex? If a portion of the sex that was happening was rape-adjacent, and it is no longer happening because fewer people are getting drunk and less often, then it does equate to being "less rapey".

Also less dating and less friends. The loneliest generation.

https://www.multivu.com/players/English/8294451-cigna-us-lon...

If the movies of the era are anything to go by, the alpha boomer male initiated sex by pinning an unwilling female against a wall and kissing them. The female would struggle and when freed from the kiss, slap the male. At this point in the mating rutual coitus would occur, followed by the customary cigarette in bed.

> If the movies of the era are anything to go by…

I suppose if our frame of reference for talking about reality is movies, it’s also incredibly disappointing how little respect we display as a society toward Dominic Toretto. He and his crew have saved the world several times since Gen Z were born and they act like he doesn’t even exist.

Whereas rapey James Bond got to open the London olympics, the pile of "me too" complaints he has racked up would dwarf those of even the keenest of movie producers.

Dominic Toretto and the late Brian O’Connor’s wife were recently honored at an event at the colosseum in Rome though. We live in a world of vibrant contrasts.

This isn't really about young people not drinking for health benefits.

It's about economics.

Gen X here - pay Gen Z more and stop rinsing them on costs (OK, this happens to everyone, but affects you more if you have less already), and you can bet they would participate more in all this stuff.

I'm a millennial and even I notice that weed is quickly replacing alcohol in my social group.

It's not surprising. To me, weed is healthier on the body, can't kill you if you overdose, generally cheaper per session, won't make you do stupid stuff, and doesn't make people violent.

It’s also much, MUCH more economical to bring in a few prerolled joints or a vape pen than to buy beers at a venue.

$20/cocktail is the norm here. Maybe $30 after tips and taxes. A night out at a club or bar can easily be in the hundreds. It's insane. I'd rather eat a gummy before going out and just order soda and pretend it's rum and coke.

My mate - for some unknown reason - bought a pub and lamented that "the kids aren't drinking anymore!" which anyone who goes to a lot of gigs could have easily observed. Booze is the worst, even though it can be awesome.

Personally, I think weed is horrible, and not just the smell. I once thought weed was as harmless as a banana, until I saw the state of my friends who've smoked a lot of weed for multiple decades, they're just lethargic and fugged-up, often distant, but who knows if it was the ultra-strong stuff - skunk? - that was all the rage.

A lot of other drugs have popped up in casual use, though. The stuff just gets delivered now, like a pizza.

> bought a pub and lamented that "the kids aren't drinking anymore!"

Not going to pubs doesn't mean they are not drinking, may be they are drinking at home? Curious to see stats for overall alcohol by age. With price of a pint in a pub 4x-5x more than in a supermarket it could steer people already squeezed by rising cost of living away from pubs/restrains. And AFAIK pubs cannot lower prices to keep customers, they feel inflation pressure themselves.

NHS data[0] agrees that young people are drinking less. I'm surprised about how much more 55+ years old drink.

[0] https://digital.nhs.uk/data-and-information/publications/sta...

True, yet the data shows they're not drinking as much outside pubs or venues either. The price rises have been here for decades, my old local landlord pointed at the Stella tap and said, "you can't be premium in pubs and cheap in supermarkets" to underline the price/value issue that you pointed out, and breweries have been squeezing venues for YEARS, forgetting staffing costs, etc.

I quit the booze years ago and it turns out that I/we overestimate hugely how much other people drink. Right now, Gen X and Baby Boomers are keeping the drinks industry alive, I think :D

>Personally, I think weed is horrible, and not just the smell. I once thought weed was as harmless as a banana, until I saw the state of my friends who've smoked a lot of weed for multiple decades, they're just lethargic and fugged-up, often distant, but who knows if it was the ultra-strong stuff - skunk? - that was all the rage.

I'm not saying that weed is good for everyone. It's just less "bad" than alcohol based on my experience.

Concert tickets are also increasingly expensive as is merchandise and travel. Could it be that the least well off demographic doesn't want to pay a premium for drinks when it means more queuing and inevitably a bathroom break during the performance?

Why is this being framed as a bad thing? The article seems to be blaming young people for not drinking enough and people in the comments seem to be blaming high prices for them not drinking enough.

Alcohol is an extremely harmful poison and I'm happy that young people are using it less. They shouldn't be expected to keep imbibing poisons to help prop up an old business model. The market will have to adjust.

Yeah I mean I guess I’ve just stopped drinking entirely. What’s the point? I used to drink because I was anxious in pubs. Then I stopped. Then I stopped enjoying drunk people. I don’t push my views - but I’m not interested in it any more. I’m in the UK and our drinking culture is vile. I’ve never met a person I liked more drunk. It’s the aggression that gets me.

This has been a long term trend in Europe and Asia as well, going back into the millennial era. I remember getting into arguments with American left wingers and LGBTQ Americans saying that the lack of gay bars in Asia wasn't a sign of homophobia because gay bars were in decline in Europe as well (but in fact were on the rise in the US). A combination of being able to socialise on the internet and at mainstream establishments, combined with declines in drinking alcohol, has led to a decline in gay bars in the respective regions as well.

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