The Honey Deuce
On the rise of the US Open's $10M signature cocktail
In 2006, restauranteur Nick Mautone got a call from Grey Goose vodka. The company wanted a special cocktail to serve at the US Open tennis tournament. They wanted a drink that was memorable, universally appealing, and easy to serve at high volumes.
Mautone spent the summer testing recipes. He tried one with rosemary syrup. And another with muddled lemons. “I made several variations that did not make the cut; many proved too hard for the venue to produce in large format,” he noted.
But then, one day, inspiration struck.
In one telling of the story, Mautone was at a local farmers market and saw a carton of mini honeydew melons. In another telling, he was at home scooping melon balls from a honeydew for a dessert. Either way, the melon and its color caught his eye: “Those look exactly like iridescent tennis balls,” he thought.
The melon became the core of the drink’s identity. The honey deuce, as the cocktail is known, is a mix of vodka, fresh lemonade, and raspberry liqueur, garnished with honeydew melon balls. At the Open, the drink is served in a collectible hard plastic cup with the current year and names of US Open winners printed on it.
Today, the honey deuce is a symbol of the US Open — just as the Pimm’s Cup is a symbol of Wimbledon and the mint julep is a symbol of the Kentucky Derby.
How did the drink, invented less than two decades ago, join this illustrious pantheon of athletic event cocktails?
Sure, it tastes good: It’s relatively sweet and quite refreshing. But even more important than that, the drink looks good: The raspberry liqueur gives it a pinkish color, and the bright melon balls perch atop its signature glass. It has a visual identity — a visual identity so strong that Nike designed a sneaker using the drink’s color scheme.
And, it’s ephemeral, served at only one event once a year. “This fleetingness has helped to fuel the specialness of the cocktail,” per Aleco Azqueta, vice president of marketing at Grey Goose North America.
“For many fans, the [drink is] central to their entire U.S. Open experience. The tournament is a stylish affair, and it often feels like the honey deuce is treated as a fashion accessory,” according to Azqueta. “As Instagram and other platforms have become more popular, we noticed the Grey Goose Honey Deuce was a popular snap to capture at the tournament and is featured all over Instagram, mainly due to its eye-catching color and the tennis-inspired honeydew balls.”
The drink isn’t just a symbol or accessory; it’s also a moneymaker. In 2023, the honey deuce sold for $22 per drink. The US Open sold 450,000 of them, an 11% increase in sales from the prior year. The cocktail, in turn, brought in almost $10 million in revenue in 2023. Since its introduction, over 2.25 million honey deuces have been sold at the US Open.
So, the honey deuce is the real winner of this Grand Slam.
