The cannabis brand Ayrloom is upping the game in New York’s edible market with its line of cannabis-infused beverages.
Ayrloom is the cannabis branch of Beak & Skiff Apple Orchards, which produces 1911 Established Hard Cider in Syracuse, New York. The brand offers a line of pre-rolls, vapes, gummies, balms and tinctures, but their claim to fame is easily their beverages.
“Beverage making is really in our DNA,” said Mack Hueber, President of Ayrloom. “We started really with fresh cider back in the 70s and evolved into making wines and hard ciders.”
Beak & Skiff was already a part of New York’s hemp program, growing the plant and extracting CBD for CBD products. When New York legalized recreational cannabis in 2021, the pivot to making THC products was the logical next step for the brand.
“The goal was really to leverage all of our experience and expertise in food and beverage making, which primarily revolved around beverages at first,” said Hueber. “When we started making beverages or planning to do so, we realized that we had more capacity to really expand the brand and have Ayrloom be a true value-added product brand, meaning, THC gummies, THC vapes, topicals, tinctures, and so forth — things that are, let’s say more socially acceptable, more normalized than smokeable flower.”
With the knowledge from making hard ciders, Ayrloom got to work developing flavors for their cannabis beverages. They originally started with sparkling water and later created a soda, a lemonade and a line of apple cider flavors, which is where they started to see more success in their customer base.
The current beverage flavors available include Honeycrisp, Cran-Apple, Black Cherry, Pineapple Mango, Yuzu Citrus, Half + Half, Vanilla Cola, Lemonade, and Orange Creamsicle, each with varying levels of THC and CBD.
“We took the juice that we make at our farm here and made our Honeycrisp flavor, which is just like the Honeycrisp 1911, and our Cran-Apple, which is just like our 1911 Cran-Apple,” said Hueber. “We wanted to try different liquid formats, you know, from a seltzer all the way to a 100% fresh juice and some sodas and lemonades in between just to see what actually resonated with the end consumer, I think where we’ve seen the most success is more of these full flavors.”
Hueber told amNewYork that for those who are new to consuming edible cannabis, beverages are an easy way to break that barrier.
“For the very first cannabis consumer, beverages are by far the best format, mainly because even if you have a 5 mg gummy, it’s tough to break a gummy up into the precise dosages,” said Hueber. “If you have a 12-ounce can, you can take an hour, two hours to drink the whole can.”
As Ayrloom continues to deepen its roots in New York’s cannabis market, they are also looking to cast a wider net into other state markets.
“Right now, the hemp-derived THC markets are the most promising for markets outside of New York to expand the brand. It allows us to maintain control of all the production in-house at one centralized location here at the farm, so meaning we can always ensure customers that they’re gonna get the same quality standards no matter if they’re buying Ayrloom in Florida, New Jersey, or a dispensary in Brooklyn,” said Hueber. “I think that’s really our kind of strategy right now is focusing on the adult use dispensary channels in New York, and then, in the intoxicating hemp-derived markets outside of New York.”
Ayrloom products can be found in New York City dispensaries, and the beverages can also be purchased in packs online. For more information, visit ayrloom.com.
