Koskenkorva, lonkero, Lapin Kulta, sauna beer and kalsarikännit: how Finns actually drink and what a pint costs in a Lapland bar.
From Koskenkorva on a Friday night to kalsarikännit in your underwear, this is a guide to how Finns actually drink.
Finnish drinking culture is built on contradictions. Finland has some of the strictest alcohol laws in Europe, state-controlled off-licences, limited pub hours, high taxes and some of the most enthusiastic drinkers. Alcohol here is not background noise. It is a deliberate act, taken seriously and often done with ceremony.
In Lapland specifically, drinking is inseparable from the environment. You drink after a day on the slopes, after a snowmobile tour, after a Northern Lights watch. The cold makes the warm drink better. The dark makes the candlelit pub cosier. The silence makes the laughter louder.
If Finland has a national spirit, spiritually and literally, it is Koskenkorva. "Kossu" to anyone who knows it. A 38% ABV grain spirit distilled from Finnish barley in the village of Koskenkorva, Ostrobothnia, since 1953. The distillery runs 24 hours a day, every day of the year.
Koskenkorva is not vodka; it is specifically a grain spirit, with a slightly rougher, more characterful profile than filtered vodka. It is, however, extremely clean: distilled to a very high purity, with minimal congeners. The hangover, Finns will tell you, is almost nonexistent compared to cheaper spirits. This is either true or a very successful piece of Finnish mythology.
How do Finns drink it? Cold, straight, from a small glass. Sometimes with a beer chaser (the combination is called a viina + kalja, the classic Finnish working-class pairing). In Lapland, you will find it at every pub, usually on a speed rail. It has been on Finnish tables at weddings, funerals, Saturday saunas and Sunday breakfasts. It is not glamorous. That is the point.
Produced by Altia (now Anora Group). Over 10 million litres sold annually in Finland. The village of Koskenkorva has a population of ~1,500 people. The distillery is one of the most efficient grain distilleries in the world, producing zero waste, the grain residue feeds livestock.
While Koskenkorva is for Finns, Finlandia is Finland's gift to the rest of the world. Launched in 1970, the same year as the first Earth Day, which is either a coincidence or a very deliberate piece of brand positioning, Finlandia was one of the first premium vodkas to market "purity" as its central selling point.
The recipe is simple by design: six-row barley grown in Finland, glacial spring water from Rajamäki, about 50 km north of Helsinki. The water is the star. Finnish glacial spring water is some of the softest in the world, low in minerals, low in hardness, which produces a distinctly clean, light vodka with virtually no aftertaste.
Finlandia is distilled over 200 times through a continuous distillation process, not batch-distilled like most premium spirits. The result is extremely consistent. It has won international blind tastings against much more expensive competitors. In Finland, it is still reasonably priced. Abroad, it wears its Finnish credentials as a badge of premium quality.
Owned by Coca-Cola HBC since 2023; before that it belonged to Brown-Forman (Jack Daniel's parent company). Available in over 80 countries. The iconic frosted bottle design has barely changed since 1970. Produced at the Rajamäki distillery, which has been making spirits since 1888.
If any beer truly belongs in a guide to Lapland bars, it is Lapin Kulta, literally "Lapland’s Gold." The brewery was founded in 1873 in Tornio, on the Finnish-Swedish border at the mouth of the Tornionjoki river, and the beer carried that Arctic address for well over a century. Hartwall closed the Tornio brewery in 2010 and moved production to Lahti, so the name still points north even though the brewing no longer happens here.
Lapin Kulta is Finland's classic pale lager, clean, light, malty, and uncomplicated. It will not win craft beer awards, and it does not try to. It is the beer that has been on Finnish cabin tables, sauna benches, and festival grounds for five generations. When Finns say "grab a beer," this is often the beer they mean. In Lapland specifically, ordering Lapin Kulta in a local pub feels right in a way no imported lager ever could.
The brand has changed corporate hands over the decades, today Hartwall and its parent Royal Unibrew own it, but the beer itself remains a Finnish staple. You will find it in every Lapland bar, every supermarket, every Alko. It is, in the best possible sense, completely ordinary.