NIO cocktails review: I tried the letterbox cocktail delivery service – here’s my verdict

It’s no secret that Brits love a cocktail and with the summer in full heat, it’s the ideal time to sit out in the sun and share a nice cold drink with a friend. But while I love drinking cocktails and often prefer it over wine or beer, I rarely make cocktails at home as I found it a hassle to buy all the ingredients needed to make a variety of drinks. 

Plus, it’s also wasteful, expensive and at best, I’ll make a G&T or Aperol Spritz as it’s only requires two bottles.

Enter ready-to-drink cocktails. Pre-mixed cocktails have seen a huge surge in popularity since lockdown thanks to the convenience of it being pre-made and packaged in a compact size that can be brought to beach, park or elsewhere.

NIO cocktails literally stands for ‘Needs Ice Only’ and is a delivery service that offers 23 premium quality ready-to-drink cocktails that only need ice to enjoy. What makes NIO unique is that each cocktail has been specially crafted by expert mixologist, Patrick Pistolesi, who’s bar was voted the 19th best in the world.

And while most pre-made cocktails come in cans, each cocktail comes in a small sachet that fits into a letterbox-friendly box and customers can pick from three to nine drinks per box.

Curious about whether this would be tastier than the pre-made canned cocktails I’ve had, I decided to try out the drinks to see whether it’s worth it.

A box of six drinks in a ‘Build a box’ set from NIO cocktails is £39, which works out to £6.50 per drink, while a box of nine drinks is £55 and works out to being slightly cheaper at around £6.10 per drink. There is also an option to pick only three drinks for £22.50 with delivery, working out to £7.50 a glass.

New customers can also sign up to the newsletter to unlock 15 percent off, which would make its cheapest price £5.19 if you bought a box of nine drinks, which is equivalent to a happy hour at a bar. 

Although it isn’t the cheapest price and there are still canned cocktails that are cheaper, it’s a decent price option and there’s also gift boxes available from £23 up, which is around the same price as a bottle of gin.

The website is very easy to use and customers have several options when it comes to picking their drinks. They can select ‘Build a box’ and pick their chosen amount of drinks from 26 cocktails.

There’s also plenty of great pre-picked and themed boxes to pick from including the bestsellers box, Casa del Daiquiri. Once you’ve picked out your choice, you simply order and it takes a maximum of four days to deliver to your address.

The delivery was super speedy and arrived through my letterbox in the next day or so. I was very impressed by the compact letterbox size of the box and it was great that it didn’t take up counter space on my kitchen table.

I was equally impressed to see that everyone drink was in a little sachet that could easily fit into a handbag if I wanted to take the drinks to a friend’s house.

Making the drinks was a very easy process, all you have to do is simply shake, tear then pour the packet into a glass with ice to enjoy. I found that it was easier to use a pair of scissors to open the packet but it was still a very easy process.

It definitely wins in convenience and I loved that I could make a cocktail on my dining table without worrying about making a mess.

I had a box of nine drinks that included a mixture of NIO cocktails’s best sellers, special summer editions and also some of its most popular cocktails.

I was immediately impressed with the incredible taste of all the cocktails and that it was very well balanced. For classic drinks like the Cosmopolitan, it was sweet without tasting overpoweringly of vodka and had a great tanginess to it.

My personal favourite cocktail is a Negroni and I can see why this is one of NIO’s bestsellers. I was very impressed with how well the vermouth, gin and Campari were all l blended and it was delightfully bitter – I purposely drank it slowly so I could savour the flavour.

There are also special summery cocktails like the Tea Sour which is a mixture of tea liquor and lemon. It was sweet, had a good sour undertone to it and I enjoyed being able to try out a new drink at home. Although I personally don’t enjoy drinking Margaritas as much, NIO’s one was a great balance of salt, lime and tequila that didn’t feel too salty in my mouth.

I poured the drinks into a martini glass I had at home and it filled it to a decent level, but I do feel like the drink volume could be bigger for the amount of money the cocktail box is.