I walked into MetLife Stadium today for the New York Giants' first preseason game of 2026 and saw something that stopped me in my tracks: Athletic Brewing. Outside the stadium, Athletic advertising was rotating across one of MetLife's massive digital pylons with the line FIT FOR ALL TIMES. Inside the Coaches Club, cans of Run Wild IPA and Upside Dawn Golden sat behind the bar.
Somewhere out on the regular concourse, with emphasis on somewhere, 19.2-ounce Athletic tall boys were being sold alongside regular beer. Four days earlier, Athletic had announced a multi-year agreement naming it a Proud Non-Alcoholic Beer Partner of MetLife Stadium, the New York Giants and the New York Jets. The announcement said Run Wild IPA and Upside Dawn Golden would be sold in 19.2-ounce cans at locations throughout the stadium, with Athletic branding planned for pylons, displays and signage throughout the building.
My first reaction was, finally. My second was less gracious, because I had tried several times since early 2024 to get Partake considered for the stadium.
My unofficial career as a Partake ambassador
I should probably explain my relationship with Partake Brewing: there isn't one. I appointed myself. I like the beer and believe in what the brand is doing, but asking for Partake anywhere I think it belongs has never been about promoting one company. It is part of the same goal that led me to build Temperates: expanding non-alcoholic choices, making drinking less feel normal, and moving the entire category forward. This piece is not sponsored, and Partake had no role in it.
I recently went back through old messages and found one I sent directly to Partake founder Ted Fleming on January 8, 2024. I told him I was a Giants club season-ticket holder with access to the Coaches Club, where there were no standard NA beer options. I had already connected with Jodie Charney, then a Premium Clubs manager, and had been told that with the season ending, the stadium would be taking a deeper look at adding brands for the following season.
So I did what any completely unauthorized, unpaid brand ambassador would do: I sent the founder a sales lead. I told Ted, "I think I created a hot lead," suggested someone from Partake follow up and send samples while decisions were being made, and told him I planned to keep requesting the beer myself. Then I wrote what I knew was coming and what I was actively working to help make happen:
"I am also thinking most stadiums will have the same opportunities opening up."
Ted responded that afternoon: "Super cool Tara — can we connect on email so I can layer in my team?" So we did, and I kept pushing. By September, I was still at it. After speaking with Jodie in person at a Giants game on September 8, 2024, I emailed Partake's Evan Cohen with another update.
I had been given two obstacles. First, I was told Partake needed to work through one of the stadium's distributors. Second, whatever the stadium wanted to order still required corporate approval. Bud Zero was the NA option available to me at that day's game.
The next morning, Cohen responded that Partake was already working with Black River Distributing, which he described as a statewide New Jersey craft-beer distributor capable of supplying any licensed account in the state. He offered a local representative who could provide product information, samples and whatever else was needed. His email ended with, "Thanks for pushing." I did, but I never saw Partake make it into MetLife during the period I was pushing for it.
Why was Athletic at MetLife a big deal?
At MetLife today, Athletic was not merely available. The brand was highly visible. Its campaign ran on an exterior pylon, its cans sat behind the Coaches Club bar and its 19.2-ounce tall boys were sold out where everyone else buys beer. The Giants' site identifies Athletic Brewing as a team sponsor. Athletic's announcement described the agreement as the first time MetLife Stadium and both home teams had aligned with a dedicated non-alcoholic brewer in this capacity.
The agreement extends beyond stadium sales. Athletic said it would appear across Giants and Jets television, radio, digital, social and fan-engagement platforms, and participate in training camps, community initiatives and select events. It also announced plans for special-edition Tri-State packaging later in 2026: Run Wild IPA carrying the Giants logo and Upside Dawn Golden carrying the Jets logo.
This is a commercial partnership, not a stadium reluctantly agreeing to keep an NA beer somewhere behind the bar. It is an NA brand being treated as a marketable part of game day.
Non-alcoholic beer has become valuable enough to sponsor the party.
Athletic became too big to ignore
I was impressed by what Athletic had built, and disappointed that I had not been able to help a smaller brand reach the same stage. Still, the conclusion was obvious: Athletic has become too big to ignore. It describes itself as America's largest dedicated non-alcoholic brewer, and it has pursued sports and live entertainment with unusual discipline.
Athletic says its products are now available at more than 75,000 retail locations and more than 200 venues nationwide. It also became Arsenal's first official non-alcoholic beer partner. After its first season at Emirates Stadium, NA beer sales there more than doubled year over year, and the partnership was extended. It has also struck a major agreement putting Athletic into more than 100 Live Nation venues.
These partnerships place Athletic in stadiums, concert venues and sporting events, settings where beer is already part of the experience. Athletic is making sure one of the available choices can be a beer without alcohol.
The consumer has changed
Non-alcoholic beer has become valuable enough to sponsor the party.
TemperatesThis is the part of the non-alcoholic story that I think gets misunderstood. The person buying an Athletic is not necessarily a "non-drinker." In its 2026 U.S. beverage-alcohol outlook, NielsenIQ reported that non-alcoholic beer, wine and spirits generated $925 million in tracked off-premise sales, up 21.9% year over year. It also found that 93% of non-alcoholic buyers purchased alcohol. Those figures show that the NA market is not limited to abstainers: many people who buy non-alcoholic products also buy alcohol.
The moderation market, by the numbers
| What NielsenIQ measured | U.S. finding |
|---|---|
| Tracked off-premise sales of non-alcoholic beer, wine and spirits | $925 million |
| Year-over-year growth in those sales | 21.9% |
| On-premise visitors who mix alcoholic and non-alcoholic options during the same occasion | 47% |
| Non-alcoholic buyers who also purchase alcohol | 93% |
Source: NielsenIQ, January 2026. The article reports off-premise sales measures alongside separate on-premise consumer findings.
The same person can drink a regular beer on Friday and an Athletic on Sunday. NielsenIQ found that 47% of on-premise visitors mix alcoholic and non-alcoholic options during the same occasion. They might have alcohol with dinner, order an NA at the game because they are driving home, follow two beers with an NA, take a dry month or simply decide they do not want alcohol today. Moderation is not necessarily sobriety or abstinence. It is choice, and choice only works when both options are actually available.
That brings me back to MetLife. After seeing all of the Athletic marketing, I wanted to see how easy it would be for a game-goer in the regular sections to buy one, so I went on a little trip around the stadium. That is where things got weird.
The partnership was easier to find than the beer
I left the Coaches Club and walked the regular stadium concourse specifically looking for Athletic. I passed one concession stand, then another and another. I kept walking. By the time I had passed at least eight concession locations, I had not seen a single Athletic can.
More importantly, I had not seen anything telling me where to find one. There was no directional signage, no obvious ATHLETIC SOLD HERE sign and no NON-ALCOHOLIC BEER callout along the normal path I was walking.
MetLife's online dining guide lists non-alcoholic beer at 11 sections, but it does not identify the brand. That is useful if you know to look it up before or during the game. It does not replace a sign you can see while you are walking.
Eventually, I found it.
The location could not have illustrated the problem more perfectly. Athletic occupied one shelf inside an otherwise conventional beer refrigerator. Above it was a giant illuminated Miller Lite sign:
IT'S MILLER TIME.
I was disappointed by how poorly the venue placement had been executed. There was no Athletic sign over the cooler and nothing visible from the walkway telling me this particular refrigerator contained the product. I had to already know Athletic existed, want it enough to go hunting for it and then get close enough to inspect the individual cans.
This is how you can launch a first-of-its-kind non-alcoholic beer partnership and still make the person choosing not to drink feel like an afterthought.
The customer journey broke at the bar
Later, I walked up to another bar and simply asked for an Athletic. Two employees were working that station, and neither one knew what I was talking about or what Athletic was. When I explained that I was looking for the non-alcoholic beer, they told me they did not have it and directed me across the way to another location where they said I could get Michelob Ultra Zero.
Consider what happened. Outside the stadium, Athletic had advertised to me on a massive digital pylon. Inside, I did what that advertising is supposed to make a customer do: I asked for the product. I was directed to a competitor. That is a serious leak in the customer journey.
To be fair, this was two people at one station. I do not know what training MetLife, its concession partners or Athletic provided stadium-wide, and I am not going to extrapolate one stop into a claim about the entire staff. I can say only what happened in front of me: neither person selling beer recognized the Athletic name or knew where it was available. Neither was prepared for perhaps the most predictable question created by the campaign outside:
"Where can I get an Athletic?"
I did not see that as the employees' failure. I saw it as an execution problem. If you are promoting a beverage this visibly, the people selling beverages should know what the product is and where to send someone who asks for it. Otherwise, you are spending money creating demand outside and losing the customer at the bar.
Meanwhile, Modelo is impossible to miss
As I continued walking, I passed the Modelo Cantina.
You cannot miss it. It is an entire branded space with enormous Modelo signage visible from across the concourse. Modelo's presence is not new. A 2021 Constellation Brands agreement with the Giants, Jets and MetLife created a 3,100-square-foot Modelo Cantina, along with in-game digital messaging and team-app ordering. That is what a mature beverage partnership looks like when marketing, placement and the purchase path reinforce one another.
I am not suggesting Athletic needs its own 3,000-square-foot temple to non-alcoholic beer tomorrow. At MetLife, the contrast showed what an established alcohol brand already had: a purchase path that reinforced its marketing. I did not need instructions, signage or a staff recommendation to find alcohol during my walk. It was already in front of me. That is the standard non-alcoholic beverages eventually have to meet if we are serious about normalizing moderation.
This isn't an anti-Athletic story
Quite the opposite. I admit that seeing Athletic at MetLife stung a little. I spent a ridiculous amount of my own time advocating for Partake. I made introductions, pushed the idea and wanted Partake to be the little brand that broke through. It was not Partake. Athletic did it.
Athletic did not steal anything from Partake. It built a remarkable business and achieved enormous scale. According to NielsenIQ figures cited in Athletic's MetLife announcement, the company holds more than half of the U.S. non-alcoholic craft beer market and outsells the next 100 NA craft brands combined. It then secured a multi-year agreement with MetLife Stadium, the Giants and the Jets.
There is a slightly brutal startup lesson buried in that. Sometimes one company knocks early, and another becomes powerful enough to kick the door down. Good for them, seriously.
In my view, every company in this category, including Partake, benefits when a dedicated non-alcoholic beer company earns this kind of real estate in American sports, and consumers trying to drink a little less benefit from seeing the choice treated as normal. Athletic has helped prove that NA beer belongs at the game. That argument is increasingly over.
Now finish the job
This was the first Giants preseason game of 2026, only four days after the agreement was announced. That timing matters because the rollout may not have been complete. Athletic's announcement said the partnership would include concourse displays, LED displays, menus, retail kiosks, digital highway signage and interactive fan promotions. What I saw at the opener did not yet match that full ambition. I hope it does.
Athletic's presence at MetLife has already demonstrated something significant: the person choosing moderation is valuable enough to market to and feature on massive digital displays outside an NFL stadium. Now make that person equally important at the moment they actually try to buy the product.
Put Athletic on the concession signs. Clearly identify which locations carry it. Make it visible from where people are walking, and make sure the people selling beer recognize the name and know where to send someone who asks.
Then do not stop at one non-alcoholic beer. Build a real NA category. Athletic deserves to be there, and so does Partake.
Partake's Pale tastes great to me. At 10 calories per can, it is the light, crisp and refreshing kind of NA beer I want at a game. I have advocated for the brand for years because I believe in the beer and in the larger goal behind Temperates: making better non-alcoholic choices easier to find wherever drinking culture happens. Give fans more than one option.
Two and a half years later, Athletic Brewing is on the Giants' partner roster, displayed on a massive MetLife pylon and stocked inside the stadium. Athletic opened the door. Stadiums should use that opening to build the whole category: make the beer as easy to find as the billboard.
After spending part of today's game walking around MetLife to see how easy it would be for a fan to find Athletic, I kept coming back to one simple difference. I was not trying to avoid getting drunk. I simply was not in the mood to drink, a feeling I have written about before in The Second Shift.
Make the beer as easy to find as the billboard.
TemperatesAlcohol finds you. Non-alcoholic beer still expects you to find it.
More on how alcohol owns the big moments in sports: When Alcohol Gets to Claim the Win and The Super Bowl's Smartest Drinker Ordered Zero.
Sources and reporting notesShowHide
New York Jets; New York Giants; MetLife Stadium; Athletic Brewing Company; NielsenIQ; Constellation Brands; Partake Brewing.