The Hidden Financial Cost of Drinking and How Much You're Really Spending

In this eye-opening episode of The Pink Cloud Frequency, we explore the hidden financial impact of alcohol on women — and why the true cost of drinking goes far beyond the price of a bottle of wine.

We'll discuss: 

•  How alcohol marketing targets women and mothers 
•  “Wine mom” culture and normalized drinking behaviors 
• The hidden financial costs of drinking
•  How alcohol-related spending compounds over time 
•  What women could build instead with reclaimed money and energy 

Come join us in this episode if you're ready to explore what alcohol is truly costing you financially!
 

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Hello everyone. Welcome to the Pink Cloud Frequency. I am your host, Brianna Wynne. Before we get started, I just want to say thank you so much for listening to this podcast. I would appreciate it if once you're done listening to this episode, you go ahead and leave a five-star written review. And if for some reason you don't want to write one, a five-star rating on Apple or Spotify would be just as well and so much appreciated. So today we're going to discuss how alcohol doesn't just cost women their health or their time. It drains women's financial resources and future opportunities. The spending on alcohol compounds far beyond the bottle itself. And that can be your grocery receipts, wine subscriptions, girls' night out, Uber rides, takeout, impulse purchases, replacing lost productivity. It translates in so many different ways. And we're living in a culture where treating yourself is heavily emphasized. And alcohol companies, of course, they know that. And alcohol companies increasingly market directly toward women because they try to tout it as empowerment messaging, right? It's framed as a reward for women's day-to-day activities. It's promoting self-care and self-focus. And we live by the idea that alcohol replenishes our lives and supports our role as caregivers. And our children see this too. How many times have we seen on social media, or who knows, maybe even your own child, how many times have we seen a picture of a child drawing their caregiver with a glass of wine? My son, one year, a couple of years ago, actually, one of the gifts he bought me for my birthday was a, it was like a variety pack of, they were little powder sachets, little flavored packets. And it was, you know, it was really so cute and of course well-intended. You know, it's like, okay, I drink alcohol, and this was a nice way to flavor up those effects. And he didn't mean anything by it. He's buying me what he thinks I should have, what I would want, what I'm going to enjoy. But I'm drinking to a point where that seems like a reasonable gift, right? A practical gift. And it's not just, you know, my son. It's not, of course, every we give gifts to people all the time, bottles of champagne, expensive bottles of wine. Again, this is just our culture. We go on vacations, we come back with bottle openers, right? With keychains that open bottles with all of this alcohol paraphernalia. That's just what we do when we don't see anything wrong with it. So we are so wrapped up in this culture, but now there's more of an emphasis on the wine mom culture. The portrayal of mothers who are stressed and overworked, or maybe even isolated, and they turn to wine as a coping mechanism. It's wine o'clock. The most expensive part of motherhood is the wine you have to drink. You see videos of moms on social media pouring out wine and dancing, listening to music now that their children are in bed? I saw a post that said, I can't wait to drink with my kids instead of because of my kids. And I mean, honestly, at what point did it become okay to vilify children that we wanted to birth simply for existing and learning how to navigate their life? Why are we so comfortable with that narrative? That we blame kids for our own harmful behaviors. Is it just easier to justify those bad habits? Or do we really actually think that? That kids are responsible for our own internal chaos? When we all know as mothers, kids are the reason that we feel so fulfilled in life. Having children and the ability to have children is natural and beautiful, and it's a literal gift. So why do we do that and then turn around and essentially shit all over it? We're mothers, so you know, we can drink, we have to drink, we need a drink, it's our kids' fault. It's become this recurring theme in social media and on the merchandise that we buy: napkins, coasters, clothes, decorations, ornaments, glasses, bags, holders for every possible location. It's self-care. You can't get in the shower without a little wine glass holder that you have to hold your wine up for the 20 minutes that you're in the shower because you can't step away from that drink for that period of time to engage in actually a routine form of self-care. It's touted as stress relief. And no, it's obviously not just the alcohol companies who view women as a growth market and frame drinking this way as self-care or empowerment or equality. It's the retail companies too. It's the food and beverage industry that encourage you to come for Mother's Day, and there's going to be a big wine special. Alcohol marketing exposure normalizes these narratives and the attitudes and behaviors that we possess. It influenced those pro-alcohol attitudes. And what does that do? It increases alcohol usage among women because we bought into it or we buy into it. The United States alcohol industry generates hundreds of billions of dollars annually. And yes, alcohol sales are actually decreasing overall in recent years. That is true. But women are still one of the industry's most important consumer groups. A study showed that women account for over 50% of US vodka sales and more than 30% of whiskey sales. Because now in this day and age, women, we have purchasing power, we have high-paying jobs. But the reality is the financial impact of drinking is significant. Because alcohol spending is rarely just alcohol spending. Those costs compound. You have your direct costs, of course, which are, you know, the wine and the liquor purchases, cocktails at restaurants and events, not just your own cocktails, but buying rounds for your friends and your family, bringing alcohol to gatherings, buying alcohol as gifts. You've got your alcohol delivery apps, you've got subscriptions to your wine club. And then you have those secondary costs too. And usually the secondary costs have more of an impact on your wallet. That's when you have the takeout food. You drank the night before, so now you're exhausted and you're groggy. And so now cooking feels so overwhelming to you that you order takeout for yourself and your family. Now, let's say that takeout food cost you $40, anywhere from $40 to $80. I think that would be, again, that is that's generous. That's that's where we're at right now in 2026. Now you do that even two times a week, and you're talking about $4,000 to $8,000 per year. How about the third-party transportation services that you have to take when you're drinking? You can't drive yourself, so you take a Lyft or an Uber. That might be $25, it might be $70. Coffee and energy drinks the next day. Now, because you woke up late, or maybe you woke up on time, but you're still feeling behind, you don't have the wherewithal to wait for your coffee to steep, so you just go to Starbucks instead. You have impulse shopping while drinking. You have hungover convenience spending because you drank. You have beauty and self-care purchases to compensate for drinking. Because now you look exhausted because you are exhausted, because you have no energy. So your skin looks haggard. And now you're buying all the creams and the lasers and the collagen to compensate for your fatigue-looking skin. When really, if you just remove alcohol, the problem would solve itself. But you're so focused on drinking that you don't see that. Alcohol is still providing you that short-term comfort, even though it's causing long-term depletion. It's attached to your motherhood stress, your career exhaustion, your social anxiety. And so then you justify spending on alcohol because you see it as relief and connection, an escape, an identity. You're justifying alcohol expenses because it's an emotional spend. You tell yourself you deserve it. You've had a stressful day, your kids have misbehaved. You need a night out that includes four rounds of drinks. You're viewing it as a reward, as a purchase tied to that identity and social belonging. But let's think about how much money you are probably spending on alcohol. You have your direct costs, like we said, the alcohol itself. So $80 a week, let's say you buy a few bottles of wine, or maybe you buy that bottle of vodka or whiskey. So $80 a week, that's over $4,000 a year. Now your secondary costs, the takeout food, the lifts, the self-care, let's say that's $150 to $250 a week. You're talking about anywhere from close to $8,000 a year to $13,000 a year. Now, over the span of 10 years, you're talking about hundreds of thousands of dollars. And again, that's being generous. I know for me personally, some weeks I might buy only one bottle of wine. But then the next week, I might be buying a bottle of wine, a bottle of tequila, some takeout food, I might be going out. It all evens out. You can buy a little bit one week or one month, and then the next month you're just you're all over the place. You end up putting out far more money than you planned on those direct costs and secondary costs. But what would happen if women reinvested that money into support or in true forms of self-care? I mean, think about it. Rather than blowing money on sleep supplements and anti-anxiety support and recovery products, what could women do with that money? You could go on a lavish vacation. Your emergency savings can bulk up. You can go to therapy sessions and figure out why you want to drink so bad in the first place. You can pay off credit card debt. You can add more money into your investment accounts. Now you have some extra money. You can think about that business startup. You can put that money into true wellness support. Maybe additional child care if you have a few kids and you really do want some time for yourself, time that would rejuvenate you and not deplete you. How about putting more money in your retirement retirement account? Or even considering early retirement. When your energy is depleted, your spending habits change. You stop making those purchases out of impulse and convenience in recovery, and you start making more intentional decisions with your money. And the thing with alcohol, again, it's never just that one big dramatic expense or that one big dramatic moment. It's all of those compounding effects. It's all of those hundreds of tiny purchases that add up and keep adding up because you're spending emotionally, because you're outsourcing, because you feel impulsive, because you need to recover, because you need to do what's more convenient. And women are absorbing those costs while also being fully aware of the impact on our households. So I encourage you to ask yourself: what is alcohol truly costing you financially? What could you build with that money instead? Because alcohol isn't just taking money from your wallet. Alcohol is taking an investment from your future. So thank you so much for joining me today. I will talk to you guys next Wednesday.