Gins in tins – the Yummy Mummy’s ruin

00:00 03:31

Flora Watkins has narrated this article for you to listen to.

I’m writing this in my car, laptop on knees and a delicious can of Tanqueray Flor de Sevilla gin and tonic in the drinks holder, while my sons are at cricket practice. It’s an inclement evening, but were it a sunny summer’s day, the Yummy Mummies would be sprawled around the boundary in their Veja trainers and prairie dresses, pastel-coloured tins in hand, cackling and catching up like some Gen X version of Hogarth’s ‘Gin Lane’.

Gins in tins are the acceptable form of ‘mother’s ruin’. First came Gordon’s G&T in a tin, followed by its pink gin, and now the chiller aisle contains more temptation than the Haribo shelves do for my children.

Bombay Sapphire, Tanqueray, Sipsmith and multiple artisan brands have got in on the act. They’re usually on offer at your preferred supermarket, with three for the price of four. That is, unless you plump for supermarket-brand gin tins, which come in at about 99p each.

Gins in tins are part of the fastest-growing drinks markets, that of ‘RTDs’ (ready-to-drink cocktails). Post-pandemic, volume sales have outperformed white spirits, with the market estimated to have reached£884 million last year, according to Alice Baker, a senior research analyst at Mintel. And usage of RTDs is highest among the under-45s, she confirms. Perma-stressed working mothers like me now think little of cracking open a Sipsmith’s canned G&T or Grey Goose vodka spritzer instead of putting the kettle on when they get in from the school run. One friend says: ‘Gins in tins at 4 p.m. on a Friday was basically why I signed my son up for cricket. It’s rude not to there.’