Non alcoholic drinks at work

[SunshineSamba]

I work in a professional office for a large company.

Went downstairs for lunch today in my office canteen and new team member pulls out his packed lunch, including 0% ale.

I was stunned. I had a can of Fanta but it feels like non alcoholic beer is different. I hope this doesn’t become the norm. AIBU?

😁apple tango looks more like piss than wine.

I wonder what the fact that caffeine - which is a stimulant and a drug (cf. energy drinks a PP mentioned) - being almost fetishised in some circles means in the workplace ?

I very much doubt that literally everyone will suddenly be doing it every day. If this is all you
have to worry about in your job, you’re doing well.

I can't work out why it would make you uncomfortable? It literally does not effect you in any way?

Yes or someone else driving your kids to school with an alcohol free beer in their hand.

I get that it's not alcohol, but something about it still weirds me out

Having a bottle of beer on your desk at work is not a good look. No-one knows it's zero alcohol unless they look closely or ask.

If it becomes a thing then companies will need to decide if they will allow it or not. I think it will be written into company policy that zero alcohol beers etc. will not be allowed due to it looking to much like the original thing.

I'm not sure that 'looking like something' would be good grounds to ban it.

I wonder if it'll become seen as fine over time. I'm kind of conflicted because I like the treat feel of a 0% beer. You lose that if you drink it for breakfast. But a mocktail would be fine, so logically 0% beer is fine.

Why? It´s just a malt drink, with zero alcohol. This is a you problem.

Wild idea… just don’t drink it for breakfast?

I remember when I was about 11 or 12 at school. We used to nip out at lunchtime and get cans of Shandy Bass from the Spar shop in town.

I mean in terms of what society does as a whole. So much stuff around whether food/drink is a treat is about a wider social context. E.g. oysters are a fancy treat now, but used to be food for the poor.

I can’t see the issue. 0.0% beers are very refreshing, not too sweet, and are a completely acceptable drink to have with lunch at work. The problem is in people’s minds only.

I wouldn’t drink it if I was customer / patient / child facing, surely beer breath is the same regardless if it has alcohol?

if in an office environment I don’t see the issue and feel it will become more and more normalised. Younger generations drink less alcohol but want more alternatives to fizzy drinks.

I think there are two issues why you probably wouldn't give it to kids:

1. It still has the 'mature' taste that most children would just really not like - maybe the beverage equivalent of Brussels sprouts.

1. It could become a 'gateway' for children to alcohol and encourage them to try 'the real stuff' before they are legally and emotionally old enough.

I personally drink NA wine and beer because I have made my own active decision that I don't want to drink alcohol - but if I did want to buy alcohol for me to drink, there's nothing stopping me and no reason why I shouldn't.

I actually think it's a great thing that NA drinks with a 'mature' taste are now going a lot more mainstream. If adults want actual alcohol, absolutely fine (in appropriate situations); but there's so much pressure in our society to be drinking 'adult' drinks when people shouldn't or don't really want to, it's good to he able to have 'adult' drinks freely available but without the single aspect of them that many people don't want, can't handle, have religious or moral objections to and causes all of the problems that are associated with what is otherwise just a refreshing beverage.

I think that, if people have a big problem with somebody drinking a harmless soft drink at work, because they personally are too fixated on associations with alcoholic versions of similar drinks and cannot separate the two, it really does sound like a them problem.

When I was about 17 we had a sponsored walk, a revolutionary idea in the 1960s, it was almost 30 miles and there was a designated lunch stop, all our bags were taken there in teachers' cars, who had been patrolling the route. I got my bag out, my lunch and a tupperware beaker with a lid. It contained lime juice and I pulled a can of Heineken from my bag, as I was pouring it there was silence, all the staff were gazing enviously, they'd been told by the Head no-one was to stop at a pub or consume alcohol but no-one told us! I was never allowed to forget it, three years later I was in a small supermarket in London where I was working and I heard someone say Still on the lager then!, it was one of my former teachers.

I’m a teacher and think it would be absolutely inappropriate to be seen drinking 0% beer!

I think Mel Robbins 'Let them' theory would work well in this instance.

Amazing how that answer just summed up everything that needed to be said in 2-3 short paragraphs. The OP's question has been answered :)

Now that the 'stigma' has been largely broken about people choosing NA but not wanting it to be obvious that they aren't drinking alcohol like everybody else (maybe fear of being bullied or mocked), I think it would be more helpful for companies to start designing and labelling cans and bottles distinctively differently from the alcoholic versions.

They could still keep the brand name on there but make it clearly different - the same way as Pepsi and Pepsi Max are clearly related and made by the same manufacturer, but are easily identifiable from a glance as to whether they are the version that is full of sugar or not.

That's just one opinion, though; it isn't universally-accepted fact.

You've no actual reason to assume that somebody will be drinking an inappropriately alcoholic drink at work, rather than an appropriate non-alcoholic soft adult drink that looks similar - it's just prejudice.

Any more than if you saw somebody drinking a glass of what is almost certainly apple or grape juice, you would automatically assume that they must be a weirdo with no sound judgment skills who is drinking wee.

I'm a teacher.
I remember when we routinely went to the pub at lunch time.

I would have zero issue with 0% beer in the staff room.

The quoted article basically says the same thing : "it's just prejudice" - "it's optical, not logical". Not sure why you're feeling contradicted.

For some reason, objecting to somebody drinking a soft drink at work that bears a passing resemblance to an alcoholic drink - even though they always clearly say '0% alcohol' or 'alcohol-free' on them if you want to have a look to assuage any doubt - reminds me of the people who make a song and dance about colleagues who need a poo at work quietly going and doing it in a designated toilet cubicle.

Surely if people were that desperate to drink at work they’d just put it in a cup or a Chillies style or Stanley type mug.