2025 has been a good year for Fierce Beer so far. A tough first quarter aside, we have released some of our most technically and commercially successful beers ever. From raising the bar on our hazy IPA production techniques, to developing three new line extensions on our flagship Cerveza brand, and landing some super-exciting new listings on core brands, we're seeing positive results in everything we do.

Perhaps the biggest highlight so far this year though has been the breakaway success of our latest Beer Cooler. In January we released Fierce Iron Brew, joining 2024's Fierce Iced Tea and Fierce Lemonade, and not only did it land successfully, it has already raised the profile of the other Coolers, so much so that within the first six months, we rebranded all three to better communicate the flavour profiles of this fledgling product range.

This year has seen the release of a plethora of lighter, simpler and fruitier takes on sessionable beer styles across the beer sector. While hard seltzers don't seem to be showing any sign of gaining the same foothold in the UK as they achieved in the USA, there is clearly room in the market for something that suits the same drinking occasions as beer, but with a drier body, some perceived sweetness, and a more overt, identifiable fruit character than the myriad NEIPAs and sours already available. We were ahead of the game on this growing trend back in 2020, and developed two new core range beers - Rhubarb and Berry - in response. Over the next couple of years we observed the continued success of lighter, fruitier styles, and set about developing a new type of beer as close as possible to a hard seltzer in colour, body and flavour profile, but using traditional beer ingredients and techniques.

Being Fierce means setting exceptional standards for ourselves, and it took a lot of work to reach both the recipe for our Beer Cooler base, and the additions required for each of the concepts. But by 2024 we were ready to release our new range, and we debuted them a year ago, at London Craft Beer Festival, where they proved themselves in a trial by fire under the sweltering heat of the Tobacco Dock vaults.

So what actually is a Beer Cooler? What separates them from the already-sessionable styles in our main Year Round range, and why do they work particularly well in the summer?

We start with Pilsner malt - the palest of our base barley malts. It provides the clean and neutral flavour profile we're looking for, without using wheat or oats, which would add too much body. We mash in at the same temperature as our Cerveza lager, towards the cooler end of the scale, which converts more of the starch into easily fermentable sugars, resulting in a lighter, drier body in the finished beer.

We use just a touch of hops - a fraction of what we use in our lagers, and even less than we use in Rhubarb - primarily for their antimicrobial properties and for other technical production purposes, rather than to provide flavour or aroma.

Like the rest of our Year Round range, our coolers are gluten-free and vegan - we use a naturally-derived enzyme during brewing, which binds to the gluten and drops it out of solution, giving the dual benefit of removing it from the beer and also clarifying the finished product. Finally, we use our most neutral, highly-attenuating yeast strain to ferment out the sugars and achieve as dry and crisp a finish as possible for our base Cooler, as well as a slightly elevated level of carbonation.

Each of the Beer Coolers then requires a different final ingredient (or ingredients). Our Iced Tea uses cold-steeped tea leaves and natural lemon flavour, while our Lemonade uses a combination of raspberry and lemon. Our Iron Brew uses a secret recipe - sorry!

The result is a range of extremely light, sparkling and refreshing drinks, based on beer but with only a hint of grain profile. Like beer, but cooler.

• Fierce Raspberry Lemonade is pale pink, with aromas of jelly babies and just the right amount of zesty lemon. It's off-dry, with less sweetness than a traditional lemonade.
• Fierce Iced Tea balances the refreshing, lightly dry character of sweet tea with lemon.
• Fierce Iron Brew, now listed across Scotmid, Morrisons and Sainsburys stores, is instantly recognisable and features the unmistakable colour and flavour of Scotland's favourite soft drink.

With more and more new fruit beers appearing as the summer stretches on, we're excited to see how far the success of our Beer Cooler range will go. To try them for yourself, buy online, or drop us a line on sales@fiercebeer.com for trade samples.