See our favorite easily packable cocktails to help you celebrate summer on the go.

three cans of 503 Distilling i'm your huckleberry lemonade with two facing backwards and one facing forward on a white background.
Courtesy of 503 Distilling

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When packing our summer picnic baskets, the first item on our list is a refreshing canned cocktail. Well, the first item on our list is ice, but after that, it’s definitely canned cocktails. Ranging from classic Negronis to new inventions like the Rocket Queen, these ready-made cocktails save you the trouble of lugging your home bar wherever you go—and they take the hassle out of determining whether your crowd likes red wine, IPAs, or hefeweizen.

The alcohol market has substantially expanded over the past few years, with hard seltzers taking the lead, and stemming from the hard seltzer trend came canned cocktails, an innovative way to enjoy an array of concoctions from anywhere. Available in low alcohol by volume (ABV) content like hard seltzers and also in higher ABV content levels like fresh-made cocktails, canned cocktails range in their strength and spirit choice to match your favorite drinks.

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The rise of canned cocktails allows for companies like LiveWire and DRNXMYTH to create specialty drinks with mixologists to reach an audience beyond local bars. Famed Los Angeles bartender Aaron Polsky created LiveWire to bring creativity into the cocktail space, encouraging mixologists to think about what they could create if a cocktail could be mass-produced. DRNXMYTH adapted to the issue of wanting to produce fresh juices while preventing separation, and created a two-chamber bottle, allowing for cold-pressed juice mixes and fresh ingredients in all its bottled cocktails. Due to the canned cocktails’ increase in popularity, companies are reinventing the aluminum experience.

Here are just a few ideas for your next picnic basket.

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