This article contributes to a burgeoning body of writing focused on children and consumption with reference to critical writing around alcohol, drinking and drunkenness. Drawing on empirical research undertaken in the United Kingdom with families with at least one child aged 5–12 years, we show that despidte being uninterested in drinking themselves, children have a sophisticated understanding of alcohol and its effects. In doing so, we contribute to recent theoretical and empirical work on social reproduction, adult–children interaction, materialities and intergenerational transmission of consumption cultures that are bound up with social rather than individualised notions of consumption. By adding non-representational theories relating to emotions, embodiment and affect to such an agenda, we also point to new fruitful avenues for research on children, childhood and consumer culture.