Pathfinder

Grasse operates out of Philadelphia and Weaver from Seattle, and Pathfinder draws on their combined category-building experience to position itself as something distinct within the AF spirits market. The brand's spirit is fermented and distilled in a copper pot still from a hemp base, producing a liquid that reviewers have compared to amaro, the intensely bitter, complex Italian-style digestif, in character: bittersweet, structurally bitter, and notably funky rather than sweet. Hemp here refers to the plant's botanical compounds and flavour profile rather than any psychoactive element.

The brand's visual and conceptual identity takes its cues from 19th-century apothecary culture, when hemp-derived preparations appeared in pharmacies as medicinal tonics. That historical reference shapes the aesthetic throughout, from packaging to broader positioning, giving Pathfinder a distinct visual grammar within the AF spirits shelf.

Pathfinder entered the UK market in 2023 through a distribution partnership with Spirits of Virtue and is available through specialist alcohol-free retailers. The range is deliberately focused on a single product rather than a broad portfolio, which positions the brand as a category reference point rather than a range-led proposition. Sober-curious drinkers who want something with genuine bitterness and structural complexity, in the amaro or digestif register, represent the natural audience.

The decision to build around an unusual base ingredient and a single, tightly defined product makes Pathfinder unusual within a category that is still establishing its range of reference styles. The premium price point reflects both the production approach and the founders' positioning ambitions.