Editor’s note: We’re chronicling how tech is changing the way we eat and drink as we lead up to this fall’s Food Loves Tech. Our annual deep dive into appropriate food and ag technologies returns to Industry City on November 2–3, 2018 and you can get $20 off the regular admission price while our early bird special lasts.
Sipping on cider from New York’s Redbyrd, or Washington’s Snowdrift or another small batch cidery makes you feel close to the orchard. Each bottle seems unique and distinct, a direct result of where and how the apples were grown. Getting that special bottle, however, when so many ciders are unavailable outside of cider tap rooms and shops, is often a challenge.
Enter Cider in Love, a new online platform, making it easier than ever to get your favorite bottle or a discover a new one.
“It’s a connection for me a city girl to the land,” Annie Bystryn, the founder of Cider in Love said while holding a glass of cider in hand.
Cider in Love is both a shopping site and a community of cider makers and lovers.
In a single shopping cart, users can purchase bottles made from heirloom and cider-specific apple varieties, directly from multiple cideries across the country, many of which were previously unavailable online. Like an order on Etsy, payment goes to directly to the farm––the cidery reviews the order, processes and ships it. Each bottle is hand-packed with love and shipped directly to your door.
You can shop by regions such as New York or Washington or California ciders or even by taste. For example, if you want a cider with notes of citrus, the platform will curate a set of ciders with that quality. Bystryn selected all the makers with ciders on the site by looking for those that have their hands directly on the process. None of the ciders are mass produced.
Read more: From the Finger Lakes, a Real Cidermaker’s Cider
From a producer standpoint, Cider in Love providers independent cideries with a virtual megaphone. Along with the current offerings the site provides each maker with biography to share their story and cider process and allows them a place to connect with a wider audience and to inspire new fans to give the beverage a permanent place in their drinking repertoire.
“Consumer rage,” Annie Bystryn said with a laugh was the inspiration for the website. “I would fall in love with a cider but find it very difficult to get it. Being a New Yorker I wanted a way to get the product from my phone, right now.”
Read more: How to Pair Hard Cider and Cheese
A marketing veteran, Bystryn first fell in love with cider during college when studying overseas she toured independent cideries in Ireland, England and Normandy. Back in the states she visited the Hudson Valley and the Pacific Northwest and was blown away by producers’ small batch offerings.
Cider in Love is her way of sharing that passion with others while making it easier than ever to sip on a glass. We’ll toast to that.
Read more: Try These Champagne-Style Ciders
