Last week, as part of a series of articles on beer and other fizzy beverages, Slate published an ode to Worcester, Massachusetts-based sparkling water brand Polar Seltzer, guest written by comedy writer Josh Gondelman. Gondelman, who grew up in Stoneham, Mass. and now lives in New York City, is a former staff writer for Showtime comedy series Desus & Mero and HBO’s Last Week Tonight with John Oliver.
“In the same way Californians rhapsodize about In-N-Out Burger and Floridians rave about the simple joys of a Publix sub, I, a Massachusetts native, evangelize about the superiority of Polar seltzer,” Gondelman wrote. “Which is to say, my enthusiasm borders on fanaticism, and my conviction crosses the line into smugness.”
As BevNET is based just outside of Boston, his essay struck very close to home for us. Although he has never worked in the beverage industry, we spoke with Gondelman – who is currently touring his standup comedy show in between stints on the picket line as a striking WGA member – to learn more about his homegrown love for Polar and to get a creative consumer’s insight into why the 141-year-old brand resonates so deeply with New Englanders, as well as why it’s still difficult to find fan favorite flavors outside of its borders.
I know a number of seltzer aficionados who love trying any new brand they can find, and there’s a lot of Facebook groups, TikToks and subreddits about it. You avoided specifically naming any other brands in your article, do you sample a lot of seltzers or are you purely a Polar man?
Oh no, no, I’m a Polar preferencialist – but not to the point of exclusion! Last night I was in San Jose at an Oaxacan restaurant, they had Topo Chico and that felt like a great refreshing accompaniment to my dinner with some friends. So it’s not just Polar. It’s the favorite but it doesn’t block out the good work all these other seltzers are doing.
You mentioned in your piece that Polar has a “patchy” distribution network. They did sign a national distribution deal with Keurig Dr Pepper back in 2020, but from your end it sounds like it’s still a bit difficult to find outside of New England, at least in New York. What is your experience of an average Polar hunt in the city? How hard is it really?
It’s less of a hunt and more like I have to clock the places where I can get the good flavors, because they do have it at a lot of places in New York. But I think by the time that they were distributing nationally, New York [already] had Hal’s, some places have Waterloo or Bubly or LaCroix as their predominant seltzers.
But it’s a very funny kind of treasure hunt. I’ll see that a place has a couple of cases of Polar upfront and I wonder if I look in the cooler if I’m going to see liter bottles of some more obscure flavors. It’s nice to have that wider distribution, but in my neighborhood I do have to think when I’m out and about “Here’s where I found this one, here’s where I can occasionally get a seasonal if they get them, and then here’s where I reliably go for the staples.”
Do you keep notes?
No, it’s not that thorough. But I will definitely come home and say to my wife, “Okay, they have that Cherry Vanilla that I like at the supermarket, but at the bodega we can get a 12-pack of cans of this” and I’m sure she’s like “That’s very nice for you.”
Since it sounds like you are, by all means, a connoisseur of seltzers, what are your feelings on the other rising homegrown Massachusetts seltzer brand, Spindrift?
Ooh, I do like Spindrift! If you go into some of those seltzer Facebook groups you’ll find that Spindrift is a controversial figure because there is a little juice in it, so it has a slightly different quality. Not in terms of good or bad, but it has a slightly different flavor profile. But I can’t really dock Spindrift too much, because I do think you should be allowed to cheat at baseball. I think it would be unfair of me to say that baseball players should be able to steal signs, but Spindrift shouldn’t be able to include 4% juice.
I know you’re not a marketer, but you’re a creative guy. What do you think of Polar’s branding? What are they doing right and is there anything you think they could do better?
I think they do a great job. One thing, and I mentioned this in Slate, is that I do really love the way the flavors rotate seasonally. I know it’s not the same as an actual rotation of crops, but it does kind of feel nice to anticipate something low stakes that comes into your life.
It isn’t going to a farmers market, obviously, but it does have that same little charge of excitement like “I wonder what this flavor will be” and “This won’t last forever.”
I’m a person that gets sucked into the trap of wanting everything that I have a whim for on demand at all hours of the day at all times of the year, and I think that that’s a very New York City thing too. The idea that you can’t have this all the time and there’s no way to change that, unless you have a little stockpile, there’s that feeling of being a kid and savoring a special treat that you got somewhere. I really appreciate that part of their branding and marketing and product strategy.
So you don’t think they need to start imitating Liquid Death or anything like that?
You mean that kind of aggressive, hardcore, straight edge type [of branding]? I think that’s fun too and I think there’s plenty of room in the marketplace for all these different things ultimately. And you know this as much as I do, once you find a couple of favorites the rest of it is all pretty fungible.
I’m not here to advise seltzer brands on how to do their thing, but I think that Polar has a real classic look. The polar bear logo is really classic. I love their integration with the Red Sox Minor League affiliate where they have the naming rights to the stadium [Polar Park, home field of the Worcester Red Sox]. Again, I feel like such a chump cheering for a branded naming right to a stadium, but I [like] the idea that Polar is in Worcester and they have the rights to a stadium in Worcester. They make a product that people like and it doesn’t seem to do more environmental damage to the world than any other company of an appreciable size, versus all the crypto companies that were sponsoring NBA arenas.
I don’t know, I think they do a good job with their awareness and planting their seeds in Worcester without going overboard with the Massachusetts and New England of it all to the point that it feels like it’s not for people elsewhere. They don’t do a “Depahted Forehead-Sweat Flavah” for the Fall.
We in Massachusetts, and I think New England in general, call it “seltzer.” But a lot of people in other parts of the country call it “sparkling water,” which is also how it’s broadly referred to in the beverage industry. Why does everyone else insist on being so wrong?
I almost just said this without couching it at all, but my first answer is anti-Semitism.
I do think that “seltzer” – it feels Jewish. I don’t know that there are many Jewish associations with “seltzer” that the term “sparkling water” doesn’t quite capture, but if I’m at a gas station looking at the beverages and I go “Do you have any seltzer?” and they’re like “Oh, that’s not a term that I use,” I’m like “I better adjust my set of cultural references in context for this.”
It feels like the legend of Van Halen and the brown M&M’s: If you don’t know what seltzer is then my whole vibe doesn’t make sense to you, probably.
Gun to your head, you have to choose just one: Polar or Dunkin’?
That’s so tough, oh geez. Okay, I know this will require an explanation, I think I would go Dunkin’.
I think Polar does a more exemplary job of what it does: the breadth of flavors, the clarity and strength of flavor and the carbonation level are all, to me, top notch seltzer features.
I don’t know if Dunkin’ necessarily has an S-tier quality coffee, and I think their baked goods certainly are a step behind the iced coffee, which is my preferred product. However, Dunkin’ does serve a more pragmatic function in my life. It’s the difference between having to find a replacement seltzer, which I can take a step down, versus – and I don’t mean to be a ‘Gotta Have My Coffee’ guy – but I do think there’s something about when you get to the airport at 5 a.m. and you see there’s no line at Dunkin’ and you get a big iced coffee and you sit at the terminal. This has just been my life this summer, when I’m not on the picket line, traveling to tour, and the idea of seeing a Dunkin’ is such an oasis. Seeing a Polar endcap in a supermarket, I do get very excited, but I’m not chemically addicted to it in the same way with caffeine.
I would rather go second choice seltzer than second choice coffee chain, and that’s where I made my decision.
This conversation has been edited and condensed for length and clarity.