Cocktails and white spirits have made a comeback among clubbers, says Datamonitor

According to research firm Datamonitor, once-booming sales of the drinks were now slowing down, with some drinkers seeing them as "too mainstream".

Two thirds of alcopops are bought by women, and men often viewed them as "too girly", it said.

The market has doubled since 1999 to �1.4bn in 2003, but Datamonitor sees sales falling almost a quarter by 2008.

"A few years ago, premixed spirits looked like the future of the alcohol industry," said Datamonitor's John Band.

"The leading drinks companies were falling over themselves to invent premixed versions of their spirit brands...but it now looks like the premixed spirits boom was just a repeat of the mid-1990s alcoholic soft drinks boom."

However, despite Datamonitor's prediction that they are "losing their cool", Britons are still the biggest spenders of alcopops, spending �23.50 a head in 2003.