The Swedish sobriety secret: dry December – and off-licences shut on a Saturday night
Christmas is synonymous with overindulgence, especially of drink. Sometimes the weather is an excuse: historically, alcohol was regarded as a way to warm up. Alcohol consumption traditionally increases in December in Europe and the US. Almost two-thirds of Britons say they intend to drink more at Christmas than they do at other times of the year, for example. In Sweden, however, Vit Jul (“White Christmas”) means “dry December”, a month when you don’t drink at all.
Over the past 15 years, the concept of a Vit Monat (White Month) – and Vit Jul in particular – has grown in popularity in Sweden. Originally a charity idea like Sober October or Dry January, it originated as a twin project between Sweden and Finland. Now, anecdotally, more Swedes are choosing to take a “white month” in December or January. Jimmy Hemmingsson of Vega Bryggeri, one of Gothenburg’s trendy new microbreweries, says: “Maybe I’m naive to say this, but I think a lot of people want to be responsible. And family will come before drink at Christmas.” Not least, he adds, because a lot of Swedish families have long drives to visit relatives over the festive period. “We go to the country at Christmas, so that means no drinking. There is a real taboo against drink-driving.”
Vit Jul stems from a decades-long project to seed the idea of responsible drinking into the Swedish population, primarily through Systembolaget, the state alcohol monopoly. The presence of Systembolaget suggests that sensible drinking habits are for life, not just for Christmas. The monopoly is invisible to outsiders at first glance. If you are drinking in restaurants or bars as a tourist, it would not be obvious that the retail sale of alcohol is strictly controlled. The penny dropped for me earlier this year when I stayed in an apartment in Gothenberg with a large fridge. I visited a gigantic supermarket to buy a bottle of gin, but despite circling the aisles multiple times, none was to be found. I decided to get some wine instead. But there was no wine either. It was the weirdly minimal selection of (low-alcohol) beer that made me realise: “Oh, maybe you can only buy proper alcohol in an off-licence here?”
I later tried – and failed – to buy alcohol twice at a Systembolaget (the monopoly and also the name of its branded stores) and learned what Swedes know by heart: on Saturday evenings and all day on Sundays, Systembolaget is closed. Most branches close at 7pm on weekdays, too. By this point, the principle was clear: “Think twice before you buy alcohol. Plan your drinking. And ask yourself on a regular basis if you might be an alcoholic.”
Temperance movements have existed in Sweden since the 1830s and the first state monopoly dates back to the 1860s and the Gothenburg Public House System. Broadly speaking, the “Goth” system (hence why some pubs in Scotland are known as “goths”) involves restricting and discouraging the consumption of spirits and redistributing profits from the sale of alcohol into the community or the state. The modern system was founded in 1955. There are more than 400 Systembolaget stores in Sweden and they adhere to strict rules. No alcohol can be more attractive to buy than any other. You cannot buy cold beer or wine – there are no chill cabinets. There are no promotional deals, no advertising and minimal signage. A visit to Systembolaget is not supposed to be fun. The effect is something closer to a funereal cash-and-carry: it certainly feels as if your visit should be conducted with sobriety and practicality.
One of the long-term impacts of the Swedish system has been to promote alcohol-free drinks alongside responsible drinking, which has surely helped to spread the White Christmassy vibes. Nathan Brinker is managing director at Vega, which was once a fish filleting factory, but now houses a brewery, restaurant and tap room. One of Vega’s biggest success stories is its own-brand alcohol-free beer, which now makes up 15% of its output and has been available in all Systembolaget stores since September. Brinker, who is from North Carolina, admits that as an American, at first Systembolaget seemed “annoying”. But once you get used to it: “Unless you are an addict, the opening hours are just part of life.”
He adds: “Swedes do poke fun at the ‘squareness’ of Systembolaget. But it has an amazing stock selection. It has 5,700 types of beer on its website and more than 25,000 products overall [available to order for home delivery or collection in-store]. You can’t get that in most supermarkets in other countries.”
The ethos of the state monopoly – and its underlying principle that alcohol should be controlled and respected – extends to the bar at Vega, says Brinker: “We don’t stock spirits, for example, because we don’t want people to lose track of what they’re drinking. We actively don’t want people to get drunk. We just want people to enjoy what we are passionate about.” The Gothenburg beer scene is, he says, “equivalent to San Diego” (known as “the craft beer capital of America”). “Vega is part of a collective endeavour whose motto is essentially, ‘Let’s just make better beer.’” This ethos is another result of the state alcohol monopoly: they are all selling to the same supplier; they are all subject to the same rules, which fosters a spirit of community. A number of Brinker’s staff have gone on to work at Systembolaget.
Emma Ziemann, three-time Swedish Sommelier champion, tells me that one of the reasons Swedes support Systembolaget is that although it is a form of control, it doesn’t necessarily increase the price of alcohol. “Even if you are not a fan of the monopoly, prestige products [such as imported wines] are cheaper, even if you are paying double tax.” This is because the deals with external wine merchants are done at volume, so the state monopoly can negotiate a better price. In any case, she says, customers are often more concerned about choice, quality and self-control than price. Wine pairings and wine flights [selections of wines presented together for tasting] are popular in high-end restaurants “because people don’t want to be overserved and don’t want to get drunk. People drink less but better. They want a serene environment.”
She describes an anomaly about Systembolaget that Swedes love to recount: it is obliged to source whatever alcohol is requested by a customer. Ziemann knows a groom who requested a drink produced domestically by his bride’s grandparents in Croatia. Systembolaget obediently sourced it. The homemade wine arrived in a Coca-Cola bottle with a handwritten label. It also sells to customers on sale or return: so you can order as much wine as you want for your wedding and send back what you don’t drink. Ziemann did this for her wedding “but we didn’t return any in the end”, she laughs.
She cites a younger generation’s interest in health and wellbeing as part of the move away from partying, as well as the impact of social media. “People don’t want to get caught drunk on camera. And they don’t want a hangover if they’re working out the next day.” Despite this, there are still trends in Swedish alcohol consumption: exotic fruit beers, rosé wine, sour beers, pet-nat sparkling wines, Amarone (an Italian dry red). Seeing as it’s Christmas, she does recommend a boozy tradition: Swedish punsch, a hot rum-based lemon and spice liqueur that dates from the 18th century.
Last year the Central Association for Alcohol and Narcotics Information (Can) in Sweden released a report that showed a trend for more people going alcohol-free. This is driven predominantly by the under-50s. (In the over-50s, conversely, there are reports of a slight rise in consumption.) According to Ulf Guttormsson of Can: “It could be the sober teenagers from the beginning of the 00s who are now in the 30 to 49 age category.” Whereas, he adds: “The new generations of pensioners have with them the alcohol consumption behaviour from their youth.” (By which he means that older people are still drinking as much as they ever were, but they stand out now more because younger people are drinking less than ever before.)
I am sure some Swedes hate Systembolaget and wish it would disappear. But very possibly they have either gone to live in Denmark (where there is no state monopoly) or to a part of Sweden from which Denmark is easily accessible, such as Malmö. An oft-cited piece of research for Nordic Studies on Alcohol and Drugs in 2020 found that in Sweden “the monopoly on distribution has strong public support”. Systembolaget regularly cites support from about 80% of the population. As it is, I couldn’t find any Swedes with a bad word to say about it. Typical responses were: “One of my favourite websites.” “Anything you want, they will get it for you.” “It’s the best curated selection of wine anywhere on the planet.” And, disbelievingly: “Have you found any Swedes who are against it?” The furthest anyone will go is a mild, joking gripe about the opening hours. But even this tiny complaint is generally seen as bad form. You should be organised enough to factor in the Friday evening after-work queue.
What Systembolaget represents is telling: Swedes are not afraid to put citizenship, community and responsibility for the group at the heart of their day-to-day lives. Indeed, they wear the hair-shirt of Systembolaget with pride. And they scorn foreigners who react as I did when I first went to buy a bottle of gin. A big part of this is about national identity and belonging. When I ask Hemmingsson to explain the difference between Swedes and Danes when it comes to alcohol, he laughs: “The Danes don’t give a fuck about anything … but we have rules.” (Ziemann says of the Danish clientele at high-end restaurants: “The Danes are very thirsty.”)
At the same time, the Swedes acknowledge that they are not angels – which is why they need the state alcohol monopoly in the first place. When people drink intentionally to get drunk, they really go for it. And among teenagers there is still a tendency to binge-drink. “The reason the monopoly exists is that, traditionally, Swedish drinking culture is about getting shitfaced,” says Hemmingsson. He sees Systembolaget as a necessary and proud national institution: “It’s like the Post Office.”
It is obvious why this kind of system was introduced in countries with freezing temperatures and scant daylight in the winter. As a 2023 World Health Organization report puts it: “The Nordic countries have a strong history since the early or mid-20th century of countering their earlier history of heavy alcohol consumption and high rates of harm by direct state control.” Iceland, Finland and Norway also have state alcohol monopolies. In the 1980s a report by the Alcohol Research Group looked into the global history of monopolies. Many non-Nordic nations have had some form of monopoly at some point in their history: France, for example, had a monopoly on spirits after the first world war and a tobacco monopoly until the 1970s. But the report concluded that in the modern world the necessary public support and consensus on public health interest would be difficult to achieve in most countries.
So what makes people put up with not being able to buy alcohol when they feel like it? The 2020 research on public support found that these policies are not simply tolerated – people argue strongly in their favour. Research has found that whether Swedes were more inclined to be left wing or right wing did not have a significant bearing on their view towards Systembolaget. What counts, it seems, is acceptance of the idea that “alcohol is a societal problem” that can be solved only by society as a whole.
The report’s author diagnosed this kind of thinking as a “separate ideological dimension” in (Swedish) people’s minds. Crudely put, they could see outside their other biases and beliefs and come together on this issue. Arguably, this “separate ideological dimension” has also been achieved regarding cigarettes and smoking in many countries beyond Sweden that otherwise insist on the protection of individual freedoms. So why not alcohol, too? Here’s to the opening up of more ideological dimensions in 2025. God Vit Jul! (Merry White Christmas!)
