Happy Dad Signs Golf Creator Big John Golfs to Multi-Year Partnership
The hard seltzer brand's multi-year deal with the 24-year-old creator includes social content, limited drops, activations, and a new YouTube series, with rollout beginning in college football markets.
- Partnership scope
- Social content, activations, limited drops, YouTube series, reported
- Creator reach
- 450M+ social views in past 90 days, per the company
- Malt seltzer ranking
- No. 4 in U.S. malt seltzer, reported
- Annual growth
- 20%+ every year since launch, reported
- Founded
- 2021, by Sam Shahidi, John Shahidi, and Kyle Forgeard
Happy Dad Hard Seltzer has signed Big John Golfs, a 24-year-old golf creator, to a multi-year partnership covering social content, activations, limited product drops, and a new YouTube series. The deal is branded "All Heart. All Happy Dad." and is structured as both a retail and social platform tied to the brand's national rollout.
The partnership will launch in college football markets before moving to full national distribution in 2027, with Gen Z identified as the primary target demographic. Big John Golfs has accumulated more than 450 million views across social platforms in the past 90 days, per the company, giving the collaboration an immediate audience footprint that most one-off sponsorships do not offer.
Happy Dad was co-founded in 2021 by CEO Sam Shahidi alongside John Shahidi and Kyle Forgeard. The company says it ranks No. 4 in U.S. malt seltzer and has posted more than 20 percent annual growth in every year since launch. The brand is distributed across the United States and Canada and has secured placements at Target and at more than 30 stadium and arena venues spanning 18 states.
Why it matters
The deal's multi-year structure and bundled scope, combining owned content, a YouTube series, limited drops, and activations, signals that beverage brands are increasingly willing to treat creators as long-term media assets rather than campaign-level placements. For a brand still consolidating its position in the No. 4 slot in malt seltzer, that kind of sustained creator partnership offers recurring impressions without the costs and lead times of traditional media. The college football market entry is also notable: it positions Happy Dad at events with dense concentrations of legal-drinking-age Gen Z consumers, the precise cohort the deal is designed to reach.
What to watch
The central open question is whether the "All Heart. All Happy Dad." platform translates creator-driven awareness into sustained retail velocity when rollout expands nationally in 2027. Brands have proven that creator content moves product during launch windows, but building durable repeat-purchase behavior among a younger audience at retail scale remains the harder and more meaningful test.
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