Kegerators are becoming a go-to solution for serving far more than just beer. With the ability to dispense drinks like cold brew, nitro coffee, kombucha, sparkling water, wine, and draft cocktails, they offer flexibility for modern beverage service. Their precise temperature control and compatibility with both CO₂ and nitrogen make them well-suited for preserving the quality and freshness of a wide range of drinks.
Designed to support fast and consistent pouring, multi-beverage kegerators help businesses improve service speed, reduce waste, and cater to diverse customer preferences. Whether used in a bar, café, or event space, they simplify operations and open the door to creative drink menus. With the proper setup and cleaning routine, a single unit can efficiently handle multiple beverages. This shift in how kegerators are used reflects growing demand for variety, convenience, and elevated drink experiences.
What are Kegerators Beyond Beer?
Multi-purpose kegerators refer to the keg coolers used for beverages and drinks other than beer. They are increasingly popular for cold-brew coffee, kombucha, or ciders. Bars and restaurants often use kegerators for pre-mixed cocktails, ensuring consistency and speed in serving drinks like margaritas and sangria.
Sparkling water enthusiasts use kegerators to carbonate water, making it easy to have a refreshing drink on tap. Wine lovers and wine servers benefit from kegerators, which maintain the ideal temperature and preserve wine more effectively by minimizing exposure to oxygen, thereby ensuring its freshness over time. This adaptability makes kegerators valuable for a wide range of beverages, enhancing convenience and quality.
Why Choose a Multi-Beverage Kegerator?
Because a multi-beverage kegerator provides you with versatility to serve different beverage and drink types. You can use these keg coolers to serve mead, kombucha, iced tea, or cold brew coffee by enriching their taste with added CO2. They are highly adaptable units to comply with optimal serving conditions. For instance, you can adjust the serving gas pressure to ensure the most accurate carbonization.
There is a growing demand for non-beer draft systems in the beverage and food service industry to expand their menus with popular options. Commercial establishments enrich their menu with new drink and beverage types, while residential applications are getting popular to increase party joy or enable children to easily reach sparkling water or iced tea during hot days.
7 Types of Beverages You Can Serve in a Kegerator
Kegerators provide versatile beverage dispensing solutions that extend beyond beer, ideal for cold brew coffee, nitro coffee, kombucha, sparkling water, cocktails, wine, and non-alcoholic drinks. Cold brew kegerators keep the coffee fresh and chilled, maintaining its smooth flavor.
Nitro coffee benefits from nitrogen infusion, resulting in a creamy texture and enhanced taste. Kombucha stays fresh and carbonated in kegerators, preventing over-fermentation. Sparkling water and seltzers are eco-friendly alternatives for bars and restaurants, while draft cocktails offer faster and more consistent service. Wine kegerators preserve freshness by preventing oxidation, and non-alcoholic options, such as lemonade and juices, expand the use of kegerators in family-friendly establishments.
1. Cold Brew Coffee
Cold brew coffee is one of the latest hits in the beverage industry thanks to its fresh and rich taste. Hence, it is consumed widely in foodservice establishments and sold by retailers. Although canned cold brew coffee is still a practical option, cold brew coffee kegerators and dispensers are an excellent way to dispense it in offices, restaurants, canteens, or senior living centers. Cold brew dispensers ensure it’s served at the perfect temperature. Moreover, they maintain the smooth flavor of cold brew while keeping it cold and fresh over extended periods.
2. Nitro Coffee
Nitro coffee is a new type of coffee that is infused with nitrogen to enhance its taste, texture, and appearance while increasing its caffeine content. Nitrogen creates tiny bubbles inside the coffee, resulting in a foamy head and a smooth, creamy texture that enhances the drinking experience. Nitro coffee-serving kegerators feature a nitrogen gas tank to infuse nitrogen during service and a nitrogen regulator to maintain pressure at 40-43 psi. Their faucets and towers should be longer to enrich the solution.
3. Kombucha
Kombucha, a fermented and flavored tea known for its health benefits, is best served chilled, making kegerators an ideal solution for serving it. Fermented beverages tend to continue fermenting unless they are properly chilled. Thus, they must be stored under proper conditions so as not to spoil their flavor and taste. The carbonation of kombucha can be maintained in a kegerator, keeping it fresh and ready for serving without losing its effervescence and reducing its sweetness.
4. Sparkling Water and Seltzers
Sparkling water and non-alcoholic seltzers are highly popular in bars, restaurants, offices, and houses, particularly during summer. This is a cost-effective and eco-friendly alternative to bottled water. Kegerators are ideal for quickly carbonating beverages and water to make sparkling water or seltzers, significantly reducing costs while increasing availability.
5. Draft Cocktails
Crafting cocktails on tap is a trend that’s gaining popularity in the hospitality industry and residential settings. Bars, restaurants, and individuals can prepare their cocktail batches, make pre-mixed cocktails, and store them in a kegerator. This allows much faster service and consistent flavor every time. The cocktails that can be dispensed with kegerators include margaritas and mojitos.
6. Wine and Prosecco
Kegerators typically use CO2 to carbonate drinks and beverages, and work with kegs that are insulated from external conditions. They can remove the air inside the kegs and infuse CO2 to minimize fermentation and aging, preserving the freshness of wine for specific tastes and flavors. Thus, kegerators enhance wine service by maintaining the ideal temperature and preventing oxidation. This ensures that draft wine maintains quality, offering customers a consistent pour every time.
7. Non-Alcoholic Beverages
Kegerators can be used for non-alcoholic options such as lemonade, juice, or soda, making them perfect for family-friendly establishments and young guests. They can store and serve iced tea, lemonade, and other juices while softening the sweetness by carbonating. Kegerators maintain the best taste and flavour of alcoholic beverages for longer, expanding their use beyond traditional bar settings and typical drink service.
4 Key Features of Kegerators for Beverages Beyond Beer
Kegerators provide precise temperature control, ensuring beverages are served at their optimal freshness and flavor. With a wide temperature range, they accommodate a diverse range of beverages, including wine, cider, mead, juice, and sparkling water. Advanced CO₂ and nitrogen systems enable precise carbonation or nitrogen infusion with adjustable pressure settings.
1. Temperature Control for Diverse Beverages
Temperature control is the key to maintaining the beverage’s freshness and flavour. Hence, kegerators feature robust systems for precise temperature control and stable cooling conditions. Kegerators can be set to a temperature range of 33°F to 44°F (0.55°C to 6.66°C), allowing operators to preserve different beverage types that require varying temperature settings.
Wine and cider can be stored at temperatures above 40°F (4.44°C), while mead, sparkling water, and juice require a stable temperature around 38°F (3.33°C). Hence, modern kegerators offer the ability to fine-tune these ranges, ensuring each drink is served at its optimal condition.
2. Advanced CO₂ and Nitrogen Systems
Kegerators are specially designed to carbonate drinks and beverages. Some units are engineered to infuse nitrogen into the beverages. Thus, they feature gas or nitrogen regulators and gas tanks as well as couplers and lines to prepare the mix and pour it through the faucet when the lever is lowered.
These systems preserve the beverage’s texture and flavor, providing customers with the perfect pour. Beverages and drinks require different mixture ratios and pressure levels. For example, cold brew coffee is best with 4-8 psi, cocktails with 5-10 psi, nitro coffee with 40-43 psi, and mead and cider with 12 psi.
3. Compatibility with Multiple Beverage Types
Modern kegerators are designed to accommodate a wide range of beverage types, including coffee, juice, cider, wine, and seltzers. They are available with multi-faucet systems, allowing you to serve multiple flavors and beverage types with a single unit.
They feature customizable setups that enable you to change the configurations to serve different beverages and drinks, not just beer. You only need to do is to carefully clean the system line and faucets while shifting to another drink or beverage to prevent spoilage in taste and flavor.
However, ciders, juice, and sweet beverages contain higher acidity, which will damage and erode the brass and chrome-plated parts. Thus, you should prefer stainless steel components to maximize the kegerator’s lifetime while maximizing healthy use.
4. Ease of Maintenance for Multi-Use Systems
Multi-purpose kegerators offer easy maintenance, making it simple to clean and change beverages. Faucets, beer or beverage lines, and couplers are removable and are suitable for washing to remove the residues that may spoil the flavors. O-rings can be easily replaced to ensure the drink or beverage you serve is not contaminated with the previous flavor.
3 Benefits of Using Kegerators for Non-Beer Beverages
Kegerators enhance the customer experience by offering unique, healthier beverages like cold brew coffee and kombucha, appealing to a diverse range of tastes, including those of health-conscious and non-alcoholic drinkers.
They increase revenue opportunities by attracting a broader customer base, including families and non-drinkers, while delivering higher profits with specialty beverages. Kegerators improve operational efficiency by enabling faster service with pre-made drinks on tap and reducing waste compared to bottled options.
1. Enhanced Customer Experience
Consumption trends are rapidly shifting towards healthier alternatives and embracing new and unique tastes and flavors. Multi-purpose kegerators increase your adaptability to this trend by bringing exceptional and healthier beverages on tap, such as cold brew coffee or kombucha.
Kegerators preserve the freshness of drinks and beverages for up to 60 days. Thus, they help your business stand out by appealing to diverse tastes and introducing fresh and trendy beverages to your guests, employees, and customers. Thus, whether customers or staff are looking for an alcohol-free option or health-conscious drinks, kegerators are the right and convenient option to expand the range of offerings, enhancing the overall experience.
Increased Revenue Opportunities
Increasing product variety and adapting menus to popular options can lead to higher earnings and profits, as well as increased sales. By serving beverages beyond beer, bars and restaurants can attract a broader range of customers, including non-drinkers, families, and children. By maintaining a standardized taste and optimal serving conditions, you can turn your guests into repeat customers, generating steady revenues. Producing or purchasing beverages, cocktails, or drinks in bulk can yield higher profit margins than bottled or canned options.
Operational Efficiency
Kegerators streamline service by allowing bartenders, guests, or even children to quickly pour pre-mixed or ready-to-serve beverages, reducing the time spent on service and simplifying the process. They minimize waste, as there’s no need to worry about spoiled bottles or single-serve containers.
Setting Up a Kegerator for Beverages Beyond Beer
Setting up a multi-beverage kegerator requires the right equipment and components. Despite the several standard parts, such as faucets, lines, towers, or kegs, kegerators may need to be modified to store and serve different types of beverages and drinks. Hence, you should first decide what you will serve and then obtain the necessary parts.
For instance, you may need nitrogen tanks for nitro coffee, specialty taps for wine or cocktails, and beverage-specific kegs to hold your drinks. Ensure to adjust the pressure and temperature settings for each beverage to ensure they’re dispensed correctly. For a step-by-step approach, refer to our kegerator installation guide to ensure everything is set up correctly from the start.
Besides, if you change the beverage you serve in a kegerator, you must clean it properly to avoid cross-contamination, which may occur in the beverage lines, couplers, or faucets. Hence, always thoroughly clean and flush your lines when switching between different drinks. Additionally, change the O-rings each time you put another drink in.
Frequently Asked Questions About Kegerators for Non-Beer Beverages
How do you clean a kegerator used for multiple beverages?
After each use, thoroughly clean your kegerator lines and faucets with a cleaning solution specifically designed for beverage systems to prevent cross-contamination and preserve flavor.
What is the best temperature for serving draft wine?
The best temperature for serving draft wine is around 45-50°F (7.22°C-10°C), while red wine should be served at 55-65°F (12.77°C-18.33°C).
Can a kegerator be used to dispense both nitro coffee and beer simultaneously?
Yes, a kegerator can be used to dispense both nitro coffee and beer simultaneously. Still, you will need a dual-tap system with separate nitrogen and CO₂ tanks to dispense each beverage properly.
Are there specific kegerators designed for kombucha?
Yes, there are kegerators explicitly designed for kombucha, offering temperature and carbonation settings that help preserve the drink’s flavor.
Can I use a standard kegerator for sparkling water?
Yes, a standard kegerator can be used for sparkling water if it has the right CO₂ system to maintain carbonation.
Do I need a special tap for draft cocktails?
Yes, some draft cocktails require a special tap depending on the ingredients, primarily if you’re serving cocktails with fruit or other solids, which may clog the standard faucets.
Conclusion
In conclusion, kegerators have evolved from their traditional role as beer-serving devices to versatile beverage dispensers that cater to a variety of drinks. With temperature control and advanced carbonation systems, kegerators preserve the freshness and flavor of beverages like cold-brew coffee, kombucha, cocktails, and even non-alcoholic options. This adaptability has expanded their use as a bar refrigeration in commercial and residential settings, making them a valuable addition for businesses seeking efficient service and households looking for diverse beverage options.
Kegerators’ compatibility with multiple beverage types enhances the customer experience by offering a variety of drinks, including healthier, non-alcoholic choices. Their ease of maintenance and customizable features make them practical solutions for serving beverages efficiently, improving sales, and attracting a broader customer base. Ultimately, kegerators have proven to be an indispensable tool for enhancing service quality and expanding drink menus in today’s competitive market.
