Resurgence Brewing is expanding its footprint with a brand new vodka soda canned cocktail line, Brightside Vibes.
This new 4.8% craft beverage is brewed with real fruit juice and cane sugar and will be available in two variety packs. The standard variety pack includes Blackberry/Lime, Pineapple/Passionfruit, Raspberry/Lemon and Tangerine/Strawberry, while the Tailgate Pack includes Tailgate Crush (Peach/Clementine), Blackberry/Lime, Pineapple/Passionfruit, and Tangerine/Strawberry.
Blackberry/Lime is based on Resurgence’s F.U. Awesome cocktail, the top-selling cocktail in their taproom. The brewery plans to keep releasing more flavors moving forward and already has new flavor combinations in mind for 2026.
Resurgence owner Jeff Ware says that Brightside Vibes is something the brewery has been working on for several years in an effort to offer everything taproom consumers and drinkers want.
“The idea behind it is we wanted to make a vodka soda seltzer, like a High Noon or a Nutrl, that actually tastes like a real cocktail instead of just a flavored soda water,” Ware said. “So we went on a journey of trying to figure out how to do that, which took us longer than was anticipated. We all went back and forth on a lot of renditions, trying to get the right flavor combos, mouthfeel, carbonations, packaging, all that stuff. It took us longer than we anticipated, but we’re pretty happy with the product and branding that came out of it.”
“I’m excited to finally get Brightside Vibes to the finish line. We thought that we could do better than High Noon and none really is playing in this space locally, except for your national players in the Buffalo market. If you go into other markets, you see a lot of craft brewers playing in this space. With Brightside Vibes, we’re competing with the national brands, which is why we really took our time because this product has to look the part, taste the part and feel the part. It’s got to stand up to national competitors and we have to appeal to the consumer. Yes, we’re a local company that is making these, but the real selling point is that they just taste better.”
Ware explains that the vodka used for Brightside Vibes is local and comes from Batavia from a neutral grain spirits manufacturer. He adds that the name came from Resurgence’s efforts to capture the true energy and the feel of Buffalo.
“We wanted something that was really Buffalo-centric and there is no better energy than when everybody sings “Mr. Brightside” by The Killers in Highmark Stadium and we wanted something that gives off a real Buffalo, exciting and happy vibe,” Ware said. “We wanted a name that gave off that Brightside vibe and someone just said, ‘that’s the name right there, Brightside Vibes,’ and that’s kind of how the name came to be.”
You can find Brightside Vibes at Resurgence’s taproom (Ware says that it will replace High Noon and other canned cocktails and seltzers), as well as liquor stores around Western New York, wherever great craft canned cocktails are sold.
“We started with beer, and if you would have told me 10 years ago that we would be making cider and RTDs, I would have said ‘you’re nuts, we have no interest in that,’ but the beer consumer is changing and nowadays it seems like the consumer drinks a little bit of everything. The Bud Light consumer is also a High Noon consumer and is also a craft beer consumer. The average drinker is now more of occasion drinker, where they drink different things on different occasions and they aren’t against trying anything. So as our customers are changing, we need to change what we are making to make sure we are fitting into the needs of the consumer,” Ware said.
Brian Campbell is co-founder and Brand Manager of the Buffalo Beer League, and writes the weekly Buffalo Beer Buzz column. If you have beer news that should be included in the Beer Buzz, Brian can be reached at brian@buffalobeerleague.com, on X (@buffbeerleague), Instagram, Threads and Untappd (@buffalobeerleague), and Facebook (@thebuffalobeerleague).
