Black Friday is November 27. For most wine and spirits brands, the stretch from now through New Year's is the biggest selling season of the year. Before you set a discount or an ad budget, work out what a new customer is likely to cost you during the holidays.
Below, we use your own ad and order data to forecast a holiday customer acquisition cost (CAC) range. Then we check that range against the orders you actually sell, and work out the first-order value you need to break even.
- Ad prices rise in Q4, but so does buyer intent. If your product is a gift, the intent usually wins and CAC drops. If it's something people buy for themselves, CAC usually rises.
- Forecast CAC from four numbers you already have: CPM, click-through rate, purchase rate and new-buyer share. Apply last year's holiday change to each.
- Plan around an expected case, and know your strong and weak cases before you commit budget.
- A single bottle or a single pack almost never pays back a paid holiday customer on the first order. A bigger first order, like a gift set or a two-pack, closes most of the gap.
- Know your break-even order value, and how much repeat buying you need to cover the rest.
Ad Prices Go Up. Your CAC Might Not.
Two things happen in Q4 at the same time. Ads get more expensive, and shoppers get more ready to buy. Which effect wins decides what a new customer costs you.
Source: Billy Grace analysis of Black Friday week 2025, reported by PPC Land. Cost per order is not the same as new-customer CAC, but it shows that a jump in ad prices does not mean an equal jump in what a customer costs you.
For alcohol, the size of that conversion lift depends almost entirely on whether your product gets bought as a gift.
The $60 bottle
A bottle is one of the easiest gifts to buy. Gift shoppers show up with a list and a deadline, and most of them have never bought from you before.
Conversion jumps. New-buyer share stays high.
Holiday CAC usually goes down.The $56 canned 8-pack
An 8-pack of canned cocktails is mostly something people buy for themselves. Many holiday orders come from regulars stocking up for parties and travel.
Conversion rises a little. New-buyer share falls.
Holiday CAC usually goes up.We'll run both brands through the same forecast so you can see where the difference comes from, and figure out which one looks more like yours.
Know your baselineAlcohol Starts From a Harder Baseline
Before the season even starts, alcohol brands pay more per customer than most DTC categories:
- Smaller, pricier audiences. Ads have to target 21+ only, and Meta and Google limit how alcohol can be advertised, so CPMs tend to run higher.
- Fewer clicks become orders. Your site has an age gate, and some visitors live in states you can't ship to.
- Heavier, costlier shipping. A glass bottle or a 7-pound case of cans, shipped with an adult signature, costs more than a t-shirt, and shoppers notice at checkout.
Break CAC Into Four Numbers
To forecast CAC, follow the money through four steps: what you pay to show the ad, how many people click, how many clicks become orders, and how many of those orders come from first-time buyers.
- CPMCost per 1,000 impressions
- CTRShare of impressions that click
- Purchase rateShare of paid clicks that order
- New-buyer shareShare of orders from first-timers
Here's how each example brand's holiday forecast flows through those steps:
| Per 1,000 impressions | Bottle brandGift purchase | 8-pack brandSelf purchase |
|---|---|---|
| Ad spend (CPM) | $23.40 | $19.50 |
| Clicks | 13.81.38% CTR | 16.81.68% CTR |
| Orders | 0.292.1% of clicks | 0.482.875% of clicks |
| New customers | 0.2585% of orders | 0.3165% of orders |
| New-customer CAC | $95 | $62 |
Illustrative examples. Averages per 1,000 impressions, not a prediction for your brand.
Don't compare those two CAC numbers to each other. The 8-pack brand's $62 looks cheaper, but it keeps less from every order. What matters is how holiday CAC compares to your own baseline, and to what one order is worth. We'll get to both.
Step 2Where Your Forecast Numbers Come From
Start with your last four representative weeks. Pull your CPM, link click-through rate, purchase rate on paid clicks, and the share of paid orders that come from new customers.
Then compare the weeks before last year's holiday push with the push itself. How much did each of those four numbers move? Apply the same changes to today's numbers to get your expected case.
Here's what that looks like for our two brands. Both saw CPMs rise 30% last season. Everything else moved differently.
| Input | Bottle brandToday → holiday | 8-pack brandToday → holiday |
|---|---|---|
| CPM | $18.00 → $23.40+30% | $15.00 → $19.50+30% |
| Click-through rate | 1.2% → 1.38%+15% | 1.6% → 1.68%+5% |
| Purchase rate | 1.5% → 2.1%+40%, gift shoppers arrive | 2.5% → 2.875%+15% |
| New-buyer share | 85% → 85%holds steady | 70% → 65%regulars stock up |
| New-customer CAC | $118 → $95 ↓19% | $54 → $62 ↑15% |
Use last year's offer as context. If you ran a gift set, a deeper discount or free shipping last year and aren't this year, don't assume the same conversion lift.
Step 3Four Adjustments Before You Trust the Number
A generic DTC forecast stops at the four inputs. Alcohol needs a few corrections, or the forecast will mislead you.
Only count traffic you can sell to.
If your ads reach states you can't ship to, those clicks will never convert, and they drag down your purchase rate. Either exclude those states in targeting, or calculate purchase rate only on traffic from states you can ship to. Otherwise your forecast blames your offer for a shipping map problem.
Applies to every brandDon't assume holiday buyers come back like your regulars.
Gift shoppers are often first-timers, and many buy once a year. When you judge whether a new holiday customer is worth it, use the repeat rate of last year's holiday cohort, not your all-year average.
Matters most for gift-driven brandsSeparate subscription first orders from one-time orders.
A new customer who starts a subscription is worth far more than one who buys a single pack. If your mix of the two shifts during the sale, a blended CAC hides it. Track the share of new customers who subscribe on their first order as a fifth number.
Matters most for subscription and replenishment brandsWatch the shipping line.
An 8-pack of 12oz cans weighs around 7 pounds packed, and glass isn't light either. If your holiday offer includes free shipping, that cost lands on every order, new or returning, and it comes straight out of what you can afford to pay for a customer.
Applies to every brand offering free shipping
Give Yourself a Range
One number is a guess. A range is a plan. Run two more versions of the forecast:
- Strong case: use better results you've actually seen in comparable weeks.
- Weak case: use worse results, especially from weeks when you spent close to this year's planned budget. Spending more usually means reaching less likely buyers, which raises CAC.
Bottle brand
Plan around $95, knowing CAC could land anywhere from $66 to $161.
| Input | Strong | Expected | Weak |
|---|---|---|---|
| CPM | $21.00 | $23.40 | $27.00 |
| Click-through rate | 1.5% | 1.38% | 1.2% |
| Purchase rate | 2.4% | 2.1% | 1.7% |
| New-buyer share | 88% | 85% | 82% |
8-pack brand
Plan around $62, knowing CAC could land anywhere from $42 to $102.
| Input | Strong | Expected | Weak |
|---|---|---|---|
| CPM | $17.00 | $19.50 | $23.00 |
| Click-through rate | 1.8% | 1.68% | 1.5% |
| Purchase rate | 3.2% | 2.875% | 2.5% |
| New-buyer share | 70% | 65% | 60% |
Replace these illustrative inputs with your own history and planned spend.
The margin checkCheck the Range Against Real Orders
Now put the range next to what one order earns you. "Kept" here means what's left after product cost, excise tax, retailer and fulfillment fees, payment processing and any shipping you cover. For each brand we'll look at two first orders: the simplest one, and a bigger one built for the holidays.
Bottle brand: one $60 bottle vs. a $150 gift order
| First order | One $60 bottle | $150 gift orderGift set, bundle or engraving |
|---|---|---|
| Kept per order | about $25 | about $70 |
| At strong CAC ($66) | −$41 | +$4 |
| At expected CAC ($95) | −$70 | −$25 |
| At weak CAC ($161) | −$136 | −$91 |
| Orders to pay back | about 4about 7 in the weak case | 23 in the weak case |
Payback assumes repeat orders earn about the same as the first.
Losing $70 on a single $60 bottle is normal. Very few spirits brands pay back a paid customer on the first order. It means the holiday plan has to do one of two things: raise what each order is worth, or make sure enough of these buyers come back.
The $150 order shows why the first option matters. Shipping and fees grow much more slowly than order value, so you keep a bigger share. At the expected CAC, the loss shrinks from $70 to $25 and you earn it back on the second order. In the strong case, you come out ahead on the first.
8-pack brand: one $56 pack vs. a $112 two-pack
| First order | One $56 8-pack | $112 two-packTwo 8-packs |
|---|---|---|
| Kept per order | about $18 | about $46 |
| At strong CAC ($42) | −$24 | +$4 |
| At expected CAC ($62) | −$44 | −$16 |
| At weak CAC ($102) | −$84 | −$56 |
| Orders to pay back | about 4about 6 in the weak case | 23 in the weak case |
Payback assumes repeat orders earn about the same as the first.
For a single pack, the number that decides whether your holiday spend works isn't the first order. It's how many of these new buyers order again within 90 days. Pull that rate for last year's holiday cohort before you set a budget.
Move the first order up to two packs and the picture changes. Shipping goes up with the second pack, but much less than the order value, so you keep a bigger share. The expected loss drops from $44 to $16, and you earn it back on the second order.
We used the same CAC range for both order sizes. If you've run gift sets or bundles before, use the numbers from those weeks instead.
The Order Value You Need to Break Even
Assume you keep about half of each order, minus the shipping you cover: about $5 per order for the bottle brand and about $10 for the 8-pack brand. Then the first order that pays back a customer works out simply:
Bottle brand
Keeps about half of each order, minus about $5 of shipping.
8-pack brand
Keeps about half of each order, minus about $10 of shipping.
Few spirits brands get a first holiday order to $200, and few canned drink brands get one to $144. That's fine, as long as you know the gap and how repeat orders will close it.
For the bottle brand, a $150 order leaves a $25 gap instead of $70. For the 8-pack brand, a $112 order leaves $16 instead of $44. That's why gift sets, bundles, engraving, variety packs and subscriptions usually do more for holiday economics than a deeper discount, which lowers both order value and what you keep.
Merchandise and other non-alcohol items you can fulfill yourself are another way to raise order value while holding on to margin. (More on that in The Hidden Revenue Most Alcohol Brands Are Leaving in the Cart.)
The forecast is a planning tool. The first few days of real data should sharpen it.
What to Do This Week
- Pull your current CPM, link click-through rate, paid-click purchase rate and new-buyer share, using only traffic from states you can ship to. If you sell subscriptions, add the share of new customers who subscribe on their first order.
- Measure how each one changed during last year's holiday season, and note what offer you were running.
- Apply those changes to today's numbers, then build strong and weak cases from comparable weeks at your planned spend.
- Calculate new-customer CAC for all three cases, and compare each to what a first order earns after shipping, at your typical order value and at the order value your holiday offer is built around (a gift set, a bundle, a two-pack).
- Pull the repeat rate of last year's holiday buyers (90-day reorder rate if you sell a restock product) so you know how many orders it takes to pay back.
Know your gap before you set the offer.
Your CAC range tells you what a new holiday customer will cost. Your break-even order value tells you how far the offer has to go to cover it. Your repeat rate tells you how much of the rest comes back later.