Something Is Shifting in Wine Country
It's not that people stopped loving wine. It's that they started asking a different question: What else could a drink do for me?
Walk into a tasting room in Santa Ynez Valley today and you'll notice something that would have been unthinkable a decade ago. Alongside flights of Syrah and Viognier, there's a new kind of pour — sparkling, effervescent, built not on grapes but on Lion's Mane, Cordyceps, and adaptogens. And the people reaching for it aren't recovering from anything. They're choosing something.
That choice has a name now: sober curious. And it's not a trend that's passing through. It's a cultural shift that's rewriting the rules of what it means to drink well — especially in the places that built their identity around wine.
The Numbers Behind the Shift
The data tells a story that's hard to ignore. According to Gallup's most recent polling, 49% of American adults say they're actively drinking less alcohol than they did five years ago. Among Gen Z adults, the numbers are even more striking — 65% say they plan to reduce their alcohol consumption, and nearly a third describe themselves as "sober curious."
The market has followed. Non-alcoholic beverage sales in the U.S. surpassed $925 million in 2025, growing at roughly 22% year over year. But the more interesting figure is what's happening within that category. The fastest-growing segment isn't non-alcoholic beer or dealcoholized wine. It's functional beverages — drinks designed not just to replace alcohol but to actively do something: support focus, calm the nervous system, boost energy without a crash.
This isn't a niche anymore. It's a parallel industry forming in real time.
Sober Curious Isn't Anti-Alcohol — It's Pro-Intentionality
One of the most common misunderstandings about the sober curious movement is that it's about abstinence. It's not. It's about intentionality.
For decades, drinking was the default social ritual. A glass of wine after work. A cocktail at dinner. A toast at every celebration. The sober curious movement doesn't reject any of that. What it does is introduce a pause — a moment of asking do I actually want this right now, and why?
That pause has created space for an entirely new category of beverages — ones that offer complexity, ritual, and even physiological benefits, without the cognitive trade-offs that come with alcohol. People aren't looking for a watered-down version of what they used to drink. They're looking for something that stands on its own.
From "Non-Alcoholic" to "Functional": A Category Redefined
There's an important distinction between non-alcoholic beverages and functional beverages — and it explains why this movement has real staying power.
Non-alcoholic drinks are defined by subtraction. They take something familiar — a beer, a wine, a cocktail — and remove the alcohol. The reference point is always the original. The question is always how close does it taste to the real thing?
Functional beverages are defined by addition. They don't start from what's been removed. They start from what's been put in — and why. Adaptogens that help the body manage stress. Nootropics that support cognitive function. Functional mushrooms that promote sustained energy at the cellular level.
This is the difference between a drink that apologizes for what it's missing and a drink that leads with what it offers. And it's why functional beverages have resonated so deeply with consumers who aren't just cutting back on alcohol — they're actively looking for something better to replace it with.
Why a Winery Became the Unlikely Leader
In 1989, the Rice family acquired 52 acres of land in Santa Ynez Valley and planted what would become one of California's first fully organic vineyards. Sunstone Vineyards & Winery grew into something iconic — a place where sustainable farming, Provençal architecture, and a deep respect for what the land could produce all came together.
So when Sunstone began developing functional beverages, it raised eyebrows. A winery? Making adaptogen drinks?
But from the inside, the move made perfect sense. The same philosophy that drove Sunstone's approach to winemaking — organic ingredients, respect for what goes into the bottle, a belief that what you drink should make you feel better — pointed directly toward functional beverages. The question was never whether to move away from wine. It was whether to offer something alongside it that served a different kind of moment.
The answer was SOLIS.
What's Actually in a Functional Beverage
SOLIS is a sparkling functional beverage built on a foundation of ingredients that each serve a specific, research-backed purpose:
Lion's Mane (2,500mg) — a functional mushroom shown to support nerve growth factor (NGF), the protein responsible for brain plasticity, learning, and memory.
Cordyceps (2,500mg) — a functional mushroom that supports ATP production at the mitochondrial level, promoting sustained natural energy without stimulant spikes.
Alpha GPC — a choline compound that crosses the blood-brain barrier and serves as a precursor to acetylcholine, the neurotransmitter essential for focus, memory, and mental processing speed.
L-Theanine — an amino acid found naturally in tea that promotes alpha brain wave activity, creating a state of calm alertness without sedation.
L-Tyrosine — an amino acid precursor to dopamine, norepinephrine, and epinephrine — the neurotransmitters behind motivation, mood, and cognitive performance under stress.
Yerba Mate — a natural source of caffeine, theobromine, and polyphenols that delivers smooth, sustained energy without the jitters or crash associated with coffee.
The result is a drink that's 100% THC-free, low-calorie, all-natural, and designed to make you feel sharper, calmer, and more present — not less. It's what happens when a brand with three decades of experience crafting what goes into a bottle turns that attention toward function.
Proof of Concept: The Montecito Wine Lounge
On March 19, 2026, Sunstone opened a new Wine Lounge on Coast Village Road in Montecito — and what's happening inside tells you everything about where this movement is headed.
The lounge serves Sunstone wines. It also serves SOLIS and Sunstone Spritz. Guests can move between a glass of estate Syrah and a can of SOLIS in the same visit, in the same space, with the same sense of occasion. There's no separate "non-alcoholic menu" tucked into the back. Functional beverages sit alongside wine as equals — because they are.
This is what the future of hospitality looks like in a sober curious world. Not either/or. Both/and. A place where the person who wants a bold red and the person who wants calm, focused energy can sit at the same table and both feel like they're drinking something worth savoring.
What Comes Next
The sober curious movement isn't going to replace wine country. But it is going to reshape it — and the brands that understand this early will be the ones that define what comes next.
The demand is clear. Consumers want drinks that are sophisticated, functional, and designed with the same care that goes into a great bottle of wine. They want options that respect their bodies and their choices. And they want to find those options in the places they already love — not in a separate, lesser aisle.
Sunstone was born in wine country. It still makes wine. But it also makes something new — something built for the way people are choosing to drink right now.
And if you're curious about what that tastes like, there's a good place to start.