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Speaker 3: I don't need to tell you all the news recently has been relentless. And this is where I would usually drop in a montage of headlines to make the point. But I mean, you know what I'm talking about. The election, the fires, the inauguration, now like nonstop reporting on executive orders from the new president, basically reshaping the federal government. I mean, folks, we could really use a drink. Or not. Actually, fewer and fewer people are saying that. I mean, turning to a drink in turbulent times has become, frankly, less attractive, especially among young people. Polls show Gen Z is drinking a lot less. And more and more people of all generations are talking about reducing or stopping drinking. They're like a bunch of movements afoot. I mean, if you've been on social media for half a second in the past few weeks, you've run into some mention of dry January. Maybe you're sticking to mocktails this month yourself. There's talk about something called mindful drinking. Instagram ads for non-alcoholic spirits and adaptogens. This is a real and undeniable cultural shift.

Speaker 4: We're back with Tom Holland. Is it Biro?

Speaker 3: Biro is the name.

Speaker 4: I love it.

Speaker 5: It is a premium non-alcoholic brew. Biro is the hero. I love it. Good morning, Rebecca. Bella Hadid has joined the ranks of celebrities ditching alcohol, revealing that she is celebrating a sobriety milestone and her fans are loving it. Welcome back to another Mocktail Monday. So in today's video, we're going to be trying Katy Perry's non-alcoholic aperitif brand called Des Soix.

Speaker 6: I choose to model a vibrant and fun sobriety that owes the world no explanation whatsoever. So cheers. And of course, there's no alcohol in this.

Speaker 3: To be sure, a lot of this has to do with more understanding and more awareness around the long term health impacts of alcohol. Even a single drink a day, studies show, can increase your risk of various kinds of cancer. But it feels like there's something more going on. I mean, what's pushing so many people to reassess their entire relationship with alcohol? And now that sobriety isn't just for people who go to meetings. What are you all doing to fill the gap? I'm Audie Cornish, and this is The Assignment. So Chris Marshall has some ideas about this. Back in 2018, he opened Sans Bar. It's the first non-alcoholic bar in the U.S.

Speaker 7: I was a kid who lived in a suburb of Houston, Texas, and was often the only kid of color growing up and always felt disconnected from community. And alcohol seemed like this way to connect me to people in my community. So I started drinking to be a part of the cool kids and connect.

Speaker 3: I've also invited Derek Brown into the conversation. I know him because he owned and ran a bunch of bars in the D.C. area. He's also written a book about low and no alcohol cocktail recipes. It's all part of his own shift towards a more mindful, scaled back relationship with drinking. Both Derek and Chris started drinking in their teens. And for Derek, it wasn't until years later that his relationship to alcohol came into focus.

Speaker 8: I was later diagnosed with bipolar disorder. And so I think that there there was a lot of self-medicating, right? That this drinking alcohol from high school onward was a way for us to deal with some of our mental health issues. It was a tool. It wasn't the best tool, but it was a tool to deal with those issues. And the thing is that our generation didn't have as much access to mental health care. Didn't have as much vocabulary around mental health care. I didn't know that that was part of my life until I was into my 30s. That's when I started to discover mental health was an issue for me. I didn't know what anxiety was. I didn't realize that depression wasn't like a cool thing that artists get every now and then. You know, I started to recognize that, like, I was different than some of the people around me. I was having these spikes in my mood in a different way. And so I think that that was a way, in a way, that alcohol was a way to kind of

Speaker 3: smooth that out and and hide it in some cases. The reason why I wanted to start there is because you guys in in in the way you kind of live your lives professionally now, I think both get at, um, you both get at two, two ideas that I feel like are really core, which is community and coping. That's what I want to talk about now, like, because alcohol does a lot for us in both those areas culturally. And Chris, Sans Bar, which is to mean without. Tell me about the idea for that, because it's not just it sounds like it wasn't just about being a guy who was sober. And still wanting to have a bar like walk me through the when that idea hit you to have the place.

Speaker 7: Yeah, I was working as a counselor here in Austin, Texas, and while working with people, I kind of worked in a mental health facility where it was like kind of fast food, fast service, right? I'd see a 50 people a day at hundreds of people in my caseload. And so the benefit of that was I was talking to a lot of people and not everyone had a clinical alcohol use disorder. A lot of people found themselves in trouble. They had a drink and they decided to drive home. Maybe they were a medical professional. It came into work a little intoxicated. These people were experiencing the consequences of alcohol use, but may not have had a problem with it. And over and over, I kept hearing people say that they wish they had some place to go where they could still practice the social piece of of going out and having drinks without the alcohol.

Speaker 3: And they were in this gray area, right? So much of our conversation is sober, not sober. And the not sober means you're really drinking and don't care about it. And the sober is this monkhood. But you're talking about a world of people in the gray, which is interesting because I think that's the market, so to speak, for the people who talk now about dry January and being sober, curious like those those same folks really, right?

Speaker 7: Absolutely. And that's what made it so difficult, you know, eight years ago is that there was just this binary choice. You were either someone who had a clinical problem with alcohol or you were someone who did not or you were someone who completely abstained. And I think there's this beautiful kind of sobriety spectrum that we have now where you can be sober, serious or sober, curious or anywhere on that spectrum and find a way to connect in community without alcohol.

Speaker 8: Yeah, I mean, that's what I talk about a lot is mindful drinking this. You know, the fact is that it's a broad spectrum of the way people approach alcohol. For some people, that means not drinking at all. For some people, that means a drinking occasionally. And some people, that means just kind of limit it to certain occasions. So ultimately, mindful drinking is just drinking in relationship to your goals and values, which is where we should be. I think I don't I don't want to speak for Chris, but for me, I don't want to give people to give up alcohol. That's not what I'm asking people to do. When I go out there and I talk about mindful drinking, I'm saying, I just want you to be aware of why you drink.

Speaker 3: When I think about that period that we met, I was new to Washington and there were all of these kind of cool kid political reporters who had covered the hill and they would go out after. And their way of socializing, even with the staffers of lawmakers. Right. The building of the B was by, quote unquote, having a drink with them. And I didn't drink that much until then, you know what I mean? Like that was my real experience with like drinking socially in the way you're talking about, where I actually felt pressure to drink more because we're out later and it's going longer and longer. I feel awkward around these people who are mostly white, in my case, and also terrifying to me because they're they're better at their jobs. Like all the anxiety. Look, look, I'm just reliving it for you. Sorry, Chris. And you just drink a little bit more each time.

Speaker 7: I think drinking is shorthand for so many things in our society. I think when we say let's grab a drink, that means I want to do business with you. I want to spend time with you. I want to discuss something important in a social context. Let's have a drink can be less go on a date. We just use alcohol for for so many different things, and we use it to be a shortcut to changing our environment or changing our mood, right? We want to just after work. We literally mark time with alcohol when you think about the morning mimosa, the afternoon cocktail and the after hours nightcap. Right. Like we mark our time with alcohol. So to Derek's point, if you're not mindful about the way that you're consuming alcohol, it just kind of seeps into every aspect of your socialization and then it can become a bit of an issue.

Speaker 3: But like you said, it's code for something to for. Let's connect in a different way. Like I'm a tea drinker. But if I ask someone like, let's have a cup of tea together, there's that's going to a lot of jokes are going to follow that. Right. That's a very weird thing to ask. It's hard enough not to ask people out for coffee. Um, when you say to someone. It's been so long, we should have a drink. It's it's like code for it's been so long, we should connect in a very different way than we would than if I just called you on the phone or asked you to go for a walk, which are also valid things to do. Right.

Speaker 8: But the instinct behind it is beautiful. Yes. The act of drinking and then drinking to the point where you can barely speak to each other and that's supposed to be connection. That's a very bad idea. That does not satisfy the initial instinct, which is I like you or I want to know you and I want to understand more about you. And so that means that we need some kind of liminal space to do that. We need some space apart from our everyday lives. And alcohol can provide that in an instant. We ascribe all of these powers to alcohol that it may not be really achieving. There's something called the expectancy effect. And this is a huge part of scientific literature on alcohol. And what it means is that a person expects certain things are going to happen, and therefore they do. Not surprisingly, that is also called the placebo effect in some cases. So here's a person who's saying, hey, an alcohol marks this change in space from work to, you know, my social life. And I know when I drink it that I'm going to feel this way. That's not to say alcohol certainly has physiological effects. It certainly does change our experience. But we ascribe all this power to it when storytelling, you know, meeting somebody for the first time, eating chocolate. All of these things have similar effects ultimately in terms of that initial burst of neurochemicals. And so alcohol can be useful as a piece of social technology. It's not the only thing. And we ascribe too much power to it. We're going to have more with Derek Brown and Chris Marshall in a moment.

Speaker 3: Stay with us.

Speaker 9: Chris, when you think about that marking change in space, what do you think about it? Well, I think it's important to think about it in a different way. I think it's important to think about it in a different way.

Speaker 7: The connections that are made are real, genuine connections. The connections that are made are real, genuine connections. You don't have to try to piece together what happened the next morning. You don't have to try to piece together what happened the next morning. You meet someone, you really get to know them. You meet someone, you really get to know them. I cannot tell you how many first dates we've seen at Sandsbar. I cannot tell you how many first dates we've seen at Sandsbar. How many corporate events, how many people come for their holiday happy hour at Sandsbar. How many corporate events, how many people come for their holiday happy hour at Sandsbar. Because when you're all alcohol-free, you're kind of reducing that risk of the boss saying something that's inappropriate. Because when you're all alcohol-free, you're kind of reducing that risk of the boss saying something that's inappropriate. There's a benefit to being in a space where connection is the core and not alcohol.

Speaker 3: And when you say no, I'm not going to have a drink when everyone else is, it's almost like you're rejecting all those things you just listed. And when you say no, I'm not going to have a drink when everyone else is, it's almost like you're rejecting all those things you just listed. And when you say no, I'm not going to have a drink when everyone else is, it's almost like you're rejecting all those things you just listed.

Speaker 7: Right. And I think that's a difficulty for people who choose not to drink, is that you are divorcing yourself from social interactions and social opportunities, right? When you tell people, I don't drink, we put your dating profile, there's an automatic, almost like moving away from that person because what they're saying, right? With that statement is, I don't want to be social. And the beauty of this, this or you're volunteering that you have a problem, like I'm thinking

Speaker 3: from the other side, like from the people who see that, you think, ah, this person has a problem and I don't want to deal with a problem.

Speaker 8: That's absolutely right. That's one of the things about alcohol that is so bizarre, right? That is the only drug where you have to tell your whole life story if you don't order it, right? Like if you say, I'm not going to have a drink, then somebody's like, oh, why, right? And they start prying into your life and they expect you to tell them everything about it. And in fact, it's actually none of their business to begin with, right? You want to share your life on your own terms, whether or not you drink or don't drink. And so I think that that's part of the culture change that we do need to see, is we need to see people be more accepting and open of people who say, I just don't want to drink today for whatever reason.

Speaker 3: One of the things I remember when I was pregnant and didn't want people to know, that's again one of those cues, right? You're not drinking. You're a woman. Well, duh, duh, duh. So I would go to the bartender ahead of time and I would do this at weddings, wherever, and I'd be like, hi, they can't know I'm not drinking. So how about you make this look like a drink, water, bubbles, limes, whatever you need to do. And all night only give me that. It was like I had to game it out so questions would not be asked.

Speaker 8: And you guys...

Speaker 3: I call that propping. Yeah. Tell me more. So when you go to the bar, what have people had to do in the past to escape that line of questioning about why you're not drinking and what shift you might be making in your life?

Speaker 8: Yeah, I call that propping. I think that is a very valid thing. At the end of the day, I don't want to lie to people. I don't want to tell people something that's not true. But maybe I don't want people to know that I'm not drinking. And so having a short stout glass of tonic with a lime on the side of it looks exactly like a gin and tonic. I don't have to tell anybody anything. I can cheers them, I can drink, and I don't have to invite intrigue into my life. And so I think that's very valid. There are people who are going to be asked more questions than other people. I do recognize, especially if you're femme-identified, if you're a woman, you're probably going to invite more intrigue than as a man. And so I totally understand that, or I try to understand that and recognize that sometimes you just have to put a prop in your hand and say, no, I'm good. I'm drinking.

Speaker 3: See, because, Chris, I didn't have Sands Bar, OK? I didn't have anywhere where I could do this.

Speaker 7: And Sands Bar isn't everywhere. And that's why I really appreciate non-alcoholic beverages, non-alcoholic beers that I can just hold in my hand and no one questions what I'm drinking.

Speaker 3: Chris, you said something earlier I want to follow up on. You described the bar, and we've all described what we need for drinking here, sort of like what makes it work, so to speak, as its social lubricant. When you think back eight years ago, 10 years ago, how did people actually respond to the idea of the bar? Meaning when there's a profile of you in the newspaper that's like, a place called Sands Bar. It's got great lighting and chairs. And people are like, congrats, it's a library. What is this for? How did people actually respond?

Speaker 7: That first article I was in, the first comment I read said, what's next, a restaurant without food?

Speaker 3: That's not wrong, Chris. They're not wrong.

Speaker 7: I will never forget that because it was so brilliant. I was like, okay, that's actually good. But I heard other comments like, I give it three months, this is a fad.

Speaker 3: What's the comment from your family? I don't know if there was anyone in your family who was like, okay, for real, though.

Speaker 7: What's this? You have a real job. You have health insurance. You should probably stick to counseling. There was a lot of discouragement into entrepreneurship, but I knew this is something that was going to work. I knew it was. And I was fortunate enough to be in process of building this business as non-alcoholic spirits were becoming a thing. If I was a year-

Speaker 3: Say more.

Speaker 7: So what years was this? So 2018 is when I opened the Brick and Mortar Bar. Had I been 18 months earlier or tried to open the bar two years earlier, it would not have worked in the same way. Non-alcoholic spirits and non-alcoholic beers were just starting to take off in 2018. And I just happened to be in the water at the right time and caught the wave of non-alcoholic beverages. And that changed the conversation, right? This wasn't about removing alcohol as an option. It was about adding more options, having more choices at any bar, not just Sands Bar, but any bar. You can order a gin and tonic and now you can say with or without alcohol. That couldn't exist before 2018.

Speaker 3: So not only are things changing from this perspective that you're talking about, we now know we have more data, right, in terms of how much less people are drinking. And a lot of that is generational. We alluded to that earlier. What do you think is contributing to some of these other shifts? I don't know who wants to go first or if you guys want to swap nodes. But when both of you have seen businesses or communities grow as a result of this cultural shift, is it because there's younger people participating and they have different ideas about health and wellness? Tell me, spitball with me what you think what's driving this.

Speaker 7: Yes, younger people are drinking less. I think they're also consuming other substances more. I think what's really driving this movement are ex-wine moms. Honestly, I think that's really who's pushing this cultural piece and people who are over 35 who have the income to buy non-alcoholic beverages and frequent these events. People who had a relationship to alcohol are most likely going to be the people who look for non-alcoholic alternatives. People come into Stansford, younger folks, college kids come to Stansford all the time and they don't want anything that tastes like gin. If you've never had alcoholic gin, you don't want non-alcoholic gin. It tastes gross. So I just know that there's a real shift in the way that people think about how they show up in this world and a desire to be awake and aware as parents to be involved. We advocate so much of our ability to call the shots in our own life, pun intended. We advocate that to alcohol. We say that alcohol is the only way in which I can be courageous or fun or sing karaoke or dance. Alcohol is not a permission slip to be yourself. You can just be yourself.

Speaker 3: I kind of thought, yeah, I don't know, post-pandemic, people thought they were drinking too much during the pandemic. It feels like we're teetering on the edge of this sober, gray, sober, curious place, but we're not there yet.

Speaker 8: There's a lot of data that we started drinking more after the pandemic, and especially women started drinking more during the pandemic and then following it. But I think that when we see again and again, surveys of what is driving non-alcoholic, it's the two words, health and wellness. The fact is that we are becoming far more aware of the things that are good for us, the things that are positive for us, and the things that help us to live a quote-unquote more optimal life, and those things that are working against it. And so health and wellness is everywhere. It's a huge industry in general, and I think people are looking for genuine ways to improve their health. They want to live longer. They want to live better. And I think that by reducing or eliminating alcohol for many people can help.

Speaker 3: Sobriety in of itself is not the final destination and the final goal. Maybe for people who are obviously dealing with the disorder drinking. But I would say for the rest of us living in that gray area, sobriety in of itself is not the only goal, right? The goal is to figure out how do I connect with people without this thing? And I was reading this amazing op-ed in the New York Times. It was by Tressie McMillan Cottom. She wrote, Dry January is driving me to drink. There's a lot of smart things in here, although much of the gist is people are very annoying about this. And I'm just being marketed new things basically that are somehow better than alcohol. But one of the things that she writes in this around the idea of performative temperance being a market is she says microdosing CBD gummies because they're natural may count as being dry, but it's also isolating. And it's not lost on me that our hustle economy might prefer a lonely individual with social anxiety who sell sues with a digital screen and a gummy over a social drinker who loses her cell phone at a bar. And I didn't know how to feel at the end of that sentence. I was like, not wrong.

Speaker 7: Yeah, not wrong. I just believe that this is not about removing socialization like Derek was saying. I believe this is about creating more connection, having more opportunities to connect. The replacement of alcohol and the addition of other things is just to create that connective experience. And so I understand that people who are, you know, if you ever met someone who is more plant based and isn't eating meat, they will tell you, right? I think anyone who's changing their life and making a decision to do something different, healthier, they may be a little bit more excited about that. And I personally, I get I get the annoyance. Yeah.

Speaker 3: Yeah. Because someone should say someone's telling you, like, well, I don't drink. Try some of my ketamine vape. You know what I mean? You're just like, what the hell? Like, is this an improvement to like what else? Yes, I'll stick with my Chardonnay. But it does like, yeah, there's something weird going on about how we're selling it to people. The gray area, the dry January and what you do instead as more sober.

Speaker 8: I do want to be clear that it's still more people that are forcing a shot on you than forcing dry January on you. And so I hear that and I say, OK, cool. But also, it's not a big deal just to say I'm not participating in dry January. You can say that just as well. Somebody can say I'm not drinking. Let's get to the point where both are options. That's what's at the heart of our movement is optionality, right? There's a great piece by Derek Thompson in The Atlantic when he was talking about, you know, alcohol and socialization and why he chooses to drink. And the punchline is because he wants to be more social and connect with people. And I think that's wonderful. But alcohol does not have to be at the center of socialization. It can just be one part of it. I agree. Let's not replace that with ketamine, vaping and CBD gummies, right? Or if that's your choice, great. When I think of the future and I think of the bar because that's been my business for so long, who's sitting at it is everyone. People who don't drink, people who drink, people who consume cannabis, people who, I don't know, want to just, you know, stand there by themselves. It doesn't really matter. Ultimately, I want a bar that everyone has a seat at and that's what we are pushing for. And so sometimes that might come across as a little annoying, but still not more annoying than people tapping on your shoulder and being like, hey, take this shot, take this shot. That's more annoying to me.

Speaker 7: Absolutely. I envision a future in which bars are central to how we stay connected to each other. If you remove the best conversations you've had in cozy bars and remove the alcohol out of it, it was an amazing conversation. It was the environment that you were with. It was the topics that you covered in that conversation. You can remove alcohol from your best moments and memories in life and it's still an amazing time. I think that's all I'm trying to say here is that alcohol can be removed and you can still have an amazing life.

Speaker 3: Chris Marshall, Derek Brown, thank you both for talking with me. I really, really appreciate you guys digging into this with me.

Speaker 8: Yeah. Thank you for having us. I really appreciate it. Glad to do it.

Speaker 3: Chris Marshall, he's the owner of the non-alcoholic Sands Bar that's in Austin, Texas. And also Derek Brown is the founder of Positive Damage Incorporated. It's a company which offers programs and consulting services centered around mindful drinking. We didn't cover everything in this episode, and if you want to know more about the health effects of alcohol on your body, we've got you covered. Our very own Dr. Sanjay Gupta has actually covered this pretty extensively on his podcast, Chasing Life. We're going to link to one of those episodes in our show notes. The assignment is production of CNN Audio, and this episode was produced by Lori Gallaretta and Graylin Brashear. Our senior producer is Matt Martinez and the executive producer of CNN Audio is Steve Licktie. The technical director is Dan DeZula. We also had support from Haley Thomas, Alex Manassari, Robert Mathers, John D'Onora, Lenny Steinhardt, Jameis Andrus, Nicole Pessaru, and Lisa Namarro. As always, special thanks to Katie Hinman, and thank you all for listening.

Speaker 4: Science is constantly evolving with new discoveries happening every week. Whether it's tracking your genetic code, microbes surviving in space, just a glimpse of the breakthroughs happening right now. I'm Dr. Samantha Yameen, and I'm the new host of Curiosity Weekly from Discovery. Each episode, we dive into cutting edge topics with expert guests. We make sense of the biggest questions shaping our world. Listen and subscribe to Curiosity Weekly wherever you get your podcasts.