The Spritz Has Reached Peak Decadence — And Bartenders Are Fine With It

The humble Aperol spritz, declared 'drink of the summer' eight years ago, has entered what some are calling its decadent phase. Brooklyn Crab serves a 'Mega Spritz' in a goblet holding a gallon and a half of aperitivo. A Manhattan restaurant called Leonetta offers a drink named 'Better Than a Birkin' — served in a glass shaped like a purse, containing an entire bottle of Prosecco plus multiple liqueurs. Some bars have installed towering transparent spritz coolers with table-level spigots, while others pump the drinks from 10-gallon kegs or churn them in frozen daiquiri machines — despite freezing destroying the signature spritziness.

The commercial numbers behind the trend are staggering. Premium aperitif sales in the U.S. grew roughly 18 percent per year by volume between 2018 and 2023, and the category has gone so mainstream that the Cheesecake Factory now offers Strawberry Spritz and Peach Bellini Spritz variants. The Aperol spritz remains dominant, but competitors are closing in: the Hugo — a transparent spritz built on St-Germain elderflower liqueur — is gaining fast, and a flamingo-colored Sarti Rosa variation is emerging as another contender.

Contrary to what you might expect, bartenders largely welcome the spritz deluge. At Houston Hall in Greenwich Village, bartender Pamela Torres has made roughly 3,000 Aperol spritzes since the start of May, representing half to three-quarters of all mixed-drink orders. Her enthusiasm is practical: the drink requires no shaker or blender, demands no precision measurements, takes about two seconds to assemble, and almost never gets sent back. That near-perfect satisfaction rate is genuinely unusual in the industry.

Sommelier Drew Record, who estimates his San Francisco wine bar produced around 10,000 spritzes during its 18 months in business, dismisses any snobbishness about the trend. He draws a direct parallel to how the industry once lamented that nobody drank amari — and then complained again when those same bitter liqueurs became massive. The spritz, in his view, represents a decades-long education finally paying off. Venice natives have their own grievances: the spritz originated there as a working-class drink favored by gondoliers, and the global glamorization of it feels like historical revisionism to locals. Marco Salvadori, who worked at the legendary Harry's Bar in Venice, recalls a time when elite establishments flatly refused to make the drink.

For bartenders worn down by the hyper-serious craft cocktail era — dark rooms, candlelit, waistcoat-wearing mixologists — the spritz represents a welcome cultural correction. Nate Dobson, drinks director at Grey Heron Apéro Café in Manhattan, frames it as a return to social drinking: big group outings, home by 9, still having a great time. The owner of a bar in Bellingham, Washington, put it bluntly: even the worst spritz he's ever tasted beats a mediocre attempt at a forgotten pre-Prohibition craft cocktail.