Bud Light brewer is still struggling to sell the beer in North America over trans promotion backlash
Anheuser-Busch Inbev said Tuesday that revenue growth in most of its global regions was offset by a drop in North American sales, in a sign of continuing fallout from a promotion with a transgender influencer that cost it sales.
The world’s largest brewer and parent company of Bud Light said adjusted earnings for the latest quarter rose 4.1% to $5.4 billion on revenues that climbed 5% to $15.6 billion.
Revenue in the United States for the July-September period, however, tumbled 13.5%. AB InBev, based in Leuven, Belgium, noted that sales to retailers were down “primarily due to the volume decline of Bud Light.”
Bud Light sales plunged amid a conservative backlash after the brand sent a commemorative can to transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney in early April.
No...
Rightwingers started making a bunch of noise. And AB immediately caved to them. Making the vast majority of everyone else not want to buy their products either.
If they stayed on course the drop probably wouldn't happen. Instead they managed to piss of the majority of Americans on both sides.
I wonder what percentage of people who would be put off by Budweiser caving to bigots so quickly would actually regularly drink Budweiser in the first place?
Have you seen the way those hipsters guzzle PBR? Do you really think it tastes any better than Budweiser? Image is EVERYTHING when you're selling cheap beer. Budweiser could have cemented its place as a progressive all-inclusive all-american beer. Instead they gave in to the bullies, an act that no bully can respect.
PBR has a very distinct flavor. Its not great but its fine.
The best thing about a PBR is, if you don't finish it.... oh well
It goes really well with tortoise shell glasses and a beard. 🙄
Selling hipsters on a basically dead beer like PBR would be easier than getting them to drink the most mainstream of beers.
I don't think hipsters have been into pbr for like ten years, but it's possible I've just aged out of hipster circles.
Hipsters aren't really A Thing any more. Sure there are people who still act like that about stuff, but I don't really see anyone making it their whole personality any more. It's gone back to individual niches.
It’s more of “if you want a dirt cheap beer and theoretically could be a hipster”. Like I drink it when I’m looking for something cheaper than a local ale/lager and not liquor. It’s ok. Light beer is rarely worth it to me though. It’s too flavorless, if I want something with that few calories I just get whiskey
We're all about Pliny out here. I don't know if I can afford to be a hipster anymore tho
Why would they do that when it's already firmly-cemented amongst a demographic of the complete opposite, and they have 392846 other beer brands to experiment with?
The people who drink Budweiser and Bud Light are the people who buy cheap beer. Whether it's at a bar or stocking up for a party, it's like buying chips or pizza, you aren't thinking too hard about it. Miller or Busch or PBR or Coors or Old Style or Michelob or any other roughly equivalent beer (half of which are also owned by AB) works just as well. Budweiser gave people a reason to think about their beer, and didn't give anyone a reason to think positively about their beer. If you are looking at the available options, and one of them is associated with bigotry, you're going to pick anything else.
Bud Light sells at gay bars the same as any other beer lol
Gay people are just normal people.
Yeah I think a lot of people think of us as more urbane and refined, and yes, I do definitely feel that our community and culture encourages that. But also I’ve met plenty of dudebro gay guys that would reach for a bud same as their friends. Hell I’ve met nonbinary folks who are as hick as it gets.
A vanishingly small percentage. The kind of people that care about inclusivity and LGBTQ+ rights aren't the kind of people that drink Budweiser. Their core demographic skews very heavily to the dude bro side of things. They pissed off a significant chunk of their existing customers, and then by immediately backtracking lost any potential new customers they might have picked up. They basically made the worst possible set of decisions they could have.
It's so weird that people actually think this is true.
I can count on one hand with fingers left over the number of people I know who drink Bud or Bud Light, and every last one of them is deeply conservative.
So?
How many college aged kids do you know?
Why do you think there's no gay people out there that just want to chug cheap beer? Like, you're low key being really bigoted and just stomping your feet when people are trying to explain why you're wrong...
People's sexuality has zero to do with what kind of alcohol they prefer... that shouldn't need to be explained in 2023, but here we are.
How am I being bigoted?
As for the other question, at this point I think I know 2 people in college. It's been a while since I've been out of college myself so I'm mostly having to go by my memory from back then. The two people I know in college don't drink beer, and back when I was in college nobody I knew drank beer either, we all pretty much exclusively drank rum or vodka, or occasionally like a hard cider or something. My understanding is that beer consumption among millennials and younger generations is down pretty much across the board as is alcohol consumption in general (although less so than beer specifically).
This is less a question of alcohol in general though than it is one of brand perception. Bud has always sold itself as the 'murica beer, just like Fosters always sold itself as what people that have never been to Australia think is an Australian beer. Marketing and brand perception is really the only thing that differentiates most of these beers, as really they're all pretty much the same stuff in the can.
Because for some reason you think people who support LGBT rights can't enjoy cheap shitty beer...
I'm not sure what you're not getting here. It's the same as saying they don't watch sports, like fast cars, shooting guns, or any other stereotypically "straight thing".
Does that make sense?
I'm not suggesting that they can't like cheap beer, just that the vast majority of them are going to pick a different cheap beer, in part because of exactly the situation talked about in this article as well as other similar things in the past. I'm also aware of other examples, E.G. there are LGBTQ+ gun clubs, but they exist at least in part because of the over-representation of the MAGA crowd among gun owners. I've been to plenty of gun shows, and it's incredibly uncomfortable as a non-conservative to walk around and see all the confederate, MAGA, and just straight up racist paraphernalia being displayed prominently (to say nothing of the overheard conversations which are even worse). Does that mean that non-conservatives or non-straight people can't be gun owners? No, not at all, although they are statistically in the minority, and it doesn't help any that many of the retail locations for guns as well as gun ranges are at least somewhat unwelcoming to non-conservatives for a variety of reasons.
There are cultures around certain things, particularly brands, and those cultures do at least to a certain extent impact the popularity of that thing with certain demographics. This isn't some hard and fast rule, like no, as a Democrat you're not allowed to like or own a big ass Ford Truck, but if you picked the owner of one at random, there's better than even odds that they're a conservative. If said truck also has truck nuts and/or is blowing clouds of black smoke out of its tailpipe those odds shift to a near certainty. Is it impossible that there could be a liberal gay owner of a Ford F-150 with truck nuts and a confederate flag pinned up in the back of it? No, not impossible, but it's certainly incredibly unlikely.
I live in LA and go out to bars in West Hollywood occasionally. Most people at gay bars order cocktails, since they are dancing and don't want heavy stomachs; but the beer choices are typically Bud brands, and people order them. The liquor stores in West Hollywood sell Budweiser, as do the grocery stores. The restaurants there have Bud brands on tap or in bottles.
Gay people do drink Bud Light. Maybe not the same percentages or amounts as MAGA Bros, but they do drink it.
Oh well if you've got such hard-hitting science behind you I guess I just look silly.
I mean I've provided just as much data as you have. Your stance is "it's weird people think this", and my response is that's because that's what people experience. Obviously if everyone you know who drinks Bud is conservative, you're going to associate those two. I've never seen anything to suggest that isn't the case, and you've provided no evidence to counter that either.
Budweiser products have a level of market share (still, even today, after a fairly big hit) that defies political leanings. Their market share was hurt by both political reactions to this complete non-issue of a marketing idea.
The politicization of beer is dumb, as a general rule.
Gays and straights, rich and poor, people just drink beer they like (and, often, can afford to drink in bulk)
Hmm, I wonder if there's a geographical component to this. I live in the US southeast, and just about the only time I actually see people drinking beer is during large family gatherings or at large sporting events (both with a depressingly large conservative contingent). Maybe if you live in the north or a college town you experience a more varied group of beer drinkers. On the rare occasions I do see a non-conservative drinking a beer it's almost always some kind of IPA or "fancy" beer, often from a microbrewery. In general though, beer just isn't a very popular alcoholic beverage in my experience, with wines or liquors being far more popular. Even in college most people I knew would drink rum, vodka, or some kind of hard cider rather than a beer.
I went to college in Eastern Kentucky, taught in far Eastern Kentucky, and have friends from all over.
I think you're reading too much into beer consumption as part of a selection bias. My sister has 2 master's degrees and is definitely no conservative, and drinks bud light because it's easy to drink - she doesn't really like the "good" beers.
People just like things. I've had many a Bud Light inside of gay clubs - it's just beer. Not my favorite, but i haven't always been able to afford my favorites, especially with bar prices
What are you on about, just stop.
My anecdata is similar. The only people I know who drink budd/miller/any other cheap crap beers also happen to be trump voters
Yeah that’s the question. Like I’d’ve stopped buying their beer over them caving if I hadn’t stopped buying their beer over it tasting eerily similar to some nonalcoholic beers.
If you cave to conservative backlash and stop supporting me then I stop supporting you.
I generally won't drink Bud, but I used to tolerate it at shows just to get something alcoholic that wouldn't break the bank. As is, I'd rather spend more than have two shitty tastes in my mouth...
Worst part was they hung Dylan out to dry. She didn’t ask for the partnership, they wanted to use her for her demo. Then, when bigots started losing their minds, they threw her under the bus. They offered zero guidance or support of any kind. After unleashing the hate and vitriol of assholes across the country, silence. Fuck everyone involved at InBev.
This is gonna be in PR textbooks one day, if it isn't already. It's a shining example of what not to do in the face of a moral panic.
I'm almost certain the best move in the face of moral panic is to stay the course.
Acquiesce to the bigots and you piss off your supporters too.
Manipulator&Sons PR Advice for major corporations:
Step 1) (mostly applies to Americans) Hire a propaganda specialist to monitor current news propaganda cycles that will inform marketing on current minefields.
Step 2) Don't step in political minefields created by said propagandists.
Step 3) Profit.
it's a picture perfect case of how not to market towards your target audience. not anything to do with "moral panics"
Piss is the key word here.
Note that they still gained revenue. The idiots not buying Bud Light just bought another of the bajillion beers AB Inbev owns.
And not just gained revenue, but 5.4 god damn billion dollars. "Hurting" my ass. They can give me some of that so they can keep milking this bs
Hey, if they wanna give me some of that billions, I’ll let myself get dehydrated and give them my piss.
I mean, it tastes the same, probably.
Nah, you’d have to be pretty well hydrated to recreate Bud Light.
Reminds me of when the US was in some soccer related match against Belgium, and AB In-Bev decked their Budweiser cans out in American flags.
Idiots everywhere. 'yeah gimme an America beer to support team USA!!'
...Those sales went to a Belgian owned conglomerate.
Nothing is more American than global trade and purchasing shit from our allies, nothing wrong with that
Revenue in the US was down 13%, as mentioned in the article.
A bunch of idiots switch to Modelo... also owned by AB
Everyone that got pissed off about that tried other stuff and found out it was actually better.
Also, a lot of dumbasses probably went to the store and bought a different product... made by the same company.
Hang out at a gas station in the south a lot...
Lot of dumbasses buying Budweiser hoping that Budlight goes bankrupt because of their decision to get something else.
Might as well be trying to bankrupt Coke by buying Diet Coke.
Haha came here thinking the same thing. I actually liked their endorsement for that trans person but I'd never switch to fuckin bud lite. Ew.
People should be boycotting bud light because it's awful not because of their ad.
What I don't get is all the people pointing out Bud Light doesn't taste good like it's a recent discover or new change...
Like, do you all really think people are out their drinking shitty light beer because they like the taste?
They're drinking it because it's cheap and they can drink a case a day by themselves.
Hell, back in college if someone showed up with Budweiser, they got shit for wasting money on "expensive" beer. Normally everyone just bought whatever was the cheapest option, because how it tasted was the absolute lowest priority when getting enough booze for 50-100 broke college kids to binge drink.
What's funny is that you can spend less money on some cheap ass bottom shelf wine that has a higher alcohol content. You get drunk faster, for less money and you don't have to drink as much if that's your goal. You just won't look cool being the kid showing up to the rager with bottles of Bare Foot or Yellow Tail.
You can’t use wine in a beer bong. Or, maybe better said, you shouldn’t. Nor can you do a keg stand with bottles of wine. Wine beer pong sucks, a lot, I’ve played it. I’d rather put whiskey in the cups.
While I agree with you in terms of efficiency, wine just doesn’t work for drinking games the same as beer.
I didn't understand that campaign... Bud Light has always been the wilfully shitty and boring beer that appeals to (and I'm trying to be diplomatic here... ) blue collar types or those that don't really have a discerning palate.
Millennials and Zoomers by and large don't drink that much beer. Gender neutral/accepting club kids don't drink beer. If they're drinking anything, it's likely cocktails or white claw. In the odd event they went for beer it would be something quirky or higher quality than Bud fucking Light. Presumably Bud was trying to appeal to that crowd since their chief demographic is stagnant, but Bud Light was silly to not go after a group adjacent to their core audience but instead court a fickle segment of the population who doesn't give half a fuck about what they're selling and moreover is full on HATED by who already consumed their beer. Bud has decades of cultural weight about being a conservative, blue collar beer... that matters for better or worse
For the record: I'm glad a brand like Bud (who I have zero love for) made overtures to the trans community... even if it was crass commercialization. From a purely capitalist perspective, it made zero sense for a brand like Bud. What's worse, due to Bud's misstep, bigots now feel emboldened and other brands might make the decision to not be inclusive after watching this play out
Trans allies (and open minded folks in general) by and large moved on from tasteless American adjunct lagers a decade ago and drink completely different beer. Bud is a relic. Trying to give it a hurried makeover won't suddenly make it cool. Jumping into the culture war fray and folding the instant bigots complained just fucked things up Bud's appeal for anyone whose attention they had
I will say that the trans community where I am definitely are beer drinkers but overwhelmingly the vibe is locally produced stuff. I know at least two trans folk who run breweries. Maybe folk who conquer the lows of discontentment with one's body and place in society to finally live as their most authentic self despite the cultural blowback are gunna be a little more aspirational in their self care than Bud Lite?
Just sayin...
Millennials and Gen Z drink beer at higher rates than other generations
This does not hold up, mathematically.
My mom drinks bud light because she can drink all day and still use power tools with relative safety.
Your mom might be everyone's dad. Shit is real.
That sounds like who they were marketing to...
It's just water. I don't see what the big deal is. 🤷🏻♂️
InBev is anus and their generic beers are mostly horrible. People should have already been boycotting them long ago for being a soulless international conglomerate.
Chances are there is a local or regional brew that corresponds to whatever mass market swill they produce, and people should drink those small local brewery offerings instead.
No no, tasting like piss is not the issue here. They never once complained about drinking the worst made beer ever.
Clearly the issue was someone once gave 6 beers to someone they don’t like.
I mean, once that person posted on social media… well bigotry requires that they must shout about people “shoving this issues down my throat” and act like an asshole.
I mean that person who got 6 free beers posted a fucking picture about in the internet… can you believe that? From now on you gotta buy piss from someone else. I bet they’re not “woke” in South Africa…
/s
Til it becomes popular enough for these leeches to buy it out...
I think this rhetoric would hit harder if the alternatives were willing to sacrifice profit to give us a better deal.
ITT: "Bud Light is bad"
So are all of the top-selling beers in the world, and especially in America (which is the subject of this article).
We get it. You're into craft beer that costs $20/pint. I like them on occasion myself. But when I want to get drunk on beer cheaply, I'm not going to my local brewery. I'm not even going to Great Lakes or Same Adams. I'm going for a cheap, light, mass-produced pilsner. PBR, Coors, Miller Lite, Bud Light, Youngling, etc. They're all the same cheap swill.
It's the same with everything. The average person who isn't an enthusiast consumes tons of mediocre junk. Taylor Swift is probably a good analog for music: I don't see a lot of academic musicians analyzing the new music theory she's implementing, or literary analysts dissecting her lyrics. Marvel Movies are getting famous for being pretty much the same heroes journey with rushed CGI every 6 months or so. Tons of people still watch shows like Friends, the Office, and Seinfeld. McDonald still sells billions of burgers in spite of the existence of high-end restaurants.
And that's okay. Not everything. You consume needs to be some ultra-expensive artisanal elitist product.
As for Bud Light in particular, this is a a great example of a bad PR team. Either stick to your guns or don't enter the fight in the first place. The fact that they've backed down and caved to transphobes means they're much lower on my list now.
Excellent take, but in defense of the AB PR team, I don't think they were expecting so much backlash from giving a 6 pack of beer to a trans person. I think it was just a small promotion they were doing and they were not anticipating this blowing up into something big. Right wing Twitter caught wind of it and made it a much bigger deal than it was.
They did something very triggering to a group of people that are extremely easily triggered. To a normal person it seems like no big deal on the surface. From a business stand point, it makes zero sense to promote your product to people who don't like it, while triggering a huge chunk of your faithful patrons.
Might be called the Butterfly effect, idk, but the token move definitely brewed up a blizzard of conservative snowflakes.
But if you're trying to get drunk as fast as you can for as cheap as possible without any regard for taste, there are are products out there that have higher alcohol content and cost less than all of those products you named. Wouldn't that be a more efficient means to an end?
Yeah it really was a shit thing to back down on it. The right won't buy their beer anymore because Busch tried to support trans people
But now the left won't buy it because they lack conviction to stick to their word.
As you said, they shouldn't have entered the arena, or stuck to their imagery now that they're associated with it (for better or worse). Now they're paying the price of being a bunch of wet-noodles.
Heineken gets a lot of flak (at least in France) but imo it's the best beer in the "almost too diluted to pass as actual beer" category
heineken light is also impressively satisfying for a lower calorie beer, gotta say
So, I hear you enjoy golden showers
Craft beer is 20$ in the US? Wtf?
No. I mean, yeah, some beer somewhere is probably $20/pt. But most of the ones I see at the store are like $12-14 for a four-pack.
I can pick up a really decent locally made ale/stout/ipa/whatever for like $15 per six-pack, I'm sure I could spend more but that's the beer I prefer.
$20/pt would have to be a nicer restaurant or (more likely) a concert venue or sports stadium, skies the limit there lol.
You can find bottles for over $100 of you look for them.
I'll admit I'm exaggerating a bit for effect here. Wine, Whisk(e)y, pretty much every other alcohol is the same. It also depends on if you get it at some fancy restaurant or a case at a wholesaler.
Southern Tier PumKing is a seasonal Halloween brew that's pretty expensive. I see my local spot is advertising it for $16 for 4 12oz bottles. $16 will also get you 12 12oz bottles of Miller Lite, so 3x the volume for the same price. Southern Tier a moderately-sized brewery: not one of the big ones, but not a local microbrewery either. I can also see there is a listing for Weldwerks Old Rio Medianoche for $428.99 for 12 16oz bottles.
So Miller Lite is $0.11 per oz, PumKing is $0.33 per oz, and $2.23 per oz for the super expensive stuff.
I'm a Belgian brewer myself. Our country is filled to the brim with breweries, but you'll have to try hard to find beer at those prices.
I've been to American craft breweries several times. They're masters at the commercial aspect, but the beer tends to be lacking to what we're used to over here.
Is there anything special about these beers besides the obviously inflated prices? Sounds like a common marketing trick to make them more exclusive than they are.
Beer isn't wine, whiskey or other alcohols. Beer is a lot more "short term" because of the limited alcohol strength.
Many distilled drinks, and wine can evolve their taste over decades. That's why their prices can go up exponentially relative to age.
This isn't the case for beer, as their best before date is fairly limited.
I find it funny how every single European brewer thinks that their country is the only one that knows how to brew beer properly. Or anything else. In America, there's such an incredible diversity that there is not much value in reducing the whole country to such generalizations.
Interestingly, the 5th most expensive beer in history was from Belgium. The De Cam & 3 Fonteinen Millennium Geuze. So no, Belgium isn't immune to ridiculously priced beer.
The point I was making is that there is a wide range of price points available for beer (like most products). I started by defending the existence of the low-end, cheap beer. Once you get to a certain point, you're paying for a weird gimmick or status symbol more than the quality. This isn't some weird American quirk, but a global phenomenon.
I would argue it is an American quirk. Exceptions exist in other countries, but in the US it seems "normal" is the marketing term everyone avoids. A side effect of the rampant capitalism there.
Lol capitalism is ramlanr across the globe to various degrees.
Is Porsche American? What about Ferrari? Lamborghini?
Or we can look at something else like cheese. The most expensive cheese in the word is Pule, from the Balkans, ranging from $600-$1300/lb. The second is Moose cheese (Swedish, $500/lb), the third is White Stilton (British, $400/lb).
Kobe beef starts at $100/lb for low-grade stuff and goes up from there.
The most expensive champagne was "2013 Taste of Diamonds" and sold for over $2,000,000/bottle. It is, of course, French.
Does anyone in Europe, or anywhere else in the world, embrace "normal" as a marketing term? One of the cores of marketing is to differentiate a product from competition, so that only becomes an option if "normal" is itself abnormal. An example of that would be noname, and they are Canadian. Aside from that, there are certainly brands in America that Americans would describe as "normal", but that is derived from the lack of marketing rather than a converted effort to use that term.
Once again it seems like you just learned what you think you know about America from reading some news headlines, and you're generalizing that "Europe good, America bad, no where else exists"
I think you'll find that a lot of the pricing of alcohol in the US is due to taxes added at multiple levels (federal, state, local). We love vice taxes over here.
I had similar problems with Target when they just immediately decided to just cave
That's a very loose definition of the word "struggles"
Or "beer".
Careful your transphobia is showing.
More like my hydrophobia.
5.4 billion in revenue last quarter. Oh they're struggling so hard.
Conservatism is a plague of oppression. If you are not with them, you are against them.
The disease of conservatism is long overdue for a cure. Do your part by teaching your children why it is inappropriate to keep relationships with conservatives
I go to school with some conservatives and it doesn't seem like they'll ever drink bud light so you may have a point.
...So... it's making billions instead of billions? My God...
I'm only familiar with the "controversy" from the headlines, but I don't quite understand what pissed off the conservatives so much. Budweiser just sent this person a custom-branded 6-pack or something, right?
Every company sells their product to people from all walks of life, it's just not always publicized. The fact that they choose to rage against Budweiser of all brands is just ridiculous to me. Now if they were complaining about the quality of the beer, that I might understand.
Rightwing influencers need content just like every other influencer. They found out about the promotion and then went to work making the videos that would drive their audiences absolutely insane over this nonsense.
To them, simply recognizing a trans person as their name or gender they present as is enough to mean that you want to groom children. So because Busch didn't call Dylan a "he" or whatever her dead name was, suddenly Busch is supporting the indefinite rape of children. Their minds only go to the absolute extremes, and the only way to make them back down from their ingrained views is to be a family member or friend who knows them personally.
I think it's more related to the total lack of spine on their part, and their willingness to sell out one market in order to appease another.
They could have had a market for life. Just ask Subaru.
Idk... It's not a good product. I don't think they were ever going to gain market share outside their "traditional" market.
If they wanted to address that market, they should have created a new quality product and target that instead of messing with their established base.
I'm not saying this because I agree with what has happened, but just speaking objectively given the fact that a lot of the macro beer mkt is a bunch of backwards ass morons.
Their beer is awful. Maybe that’s the reason
I mean, I don't drink it, but to say. It's awful isn't accurate. It's just not for you. As nature cat said, "don't yuck someone else's yum"
As an amateur home brewer I've always been amazed by the consistency of these large lager producers. I brewed a couple lagers and they were neither good nor consistent.
"Have you ever tried to set up your own internet service provider? It's actually really difficult and we should be thanking Comcast for all the hard work they do."
Did the person ever say you should thank Budweiser for what they do? Did they ever say you should like Budweiser? Your extremely stretched analogy is terrible.
What they did praise was Budweiser's consistency. Does Comcast have good consistency? No. What they did say was it's very difficult to achieve that consistency, and that is an impressive thing to do. They never said you should like the product, nor did they say they like the product. But clearly a lot of people do like the product, unlike Comcast.
The article's talking about a drop in beer sales this year. Did its awfulness increase significantly in that period?
Wouldn’t surprise me
Honestly their Belgian beers (Leffe and Hoegaarden) are not bad for commercial beers. Probably not as good as local low volume brewery, but definitely better than Bud/Corona
They posted about trans issues and removed it so the conservatives think they support it and the trans people think they're liars (they are). They kind of get the worse of both worlds now, if they stuck with supporting trans rights, they could've at least retained the lgbt+ market
Really doubt it was because of this one incident, conservatives just sensationalize anything to do with trans people. Like... Budwieser is a trash product. Everyone knows it. Anybody with taste buds who wants to drink will grab anything else.
But ofc it makes business sense to blame it on us trans people, like this was anything, like Budweiser ever did shit for us in the first place...
Iirc they backed a trans influencer drawing conservative outrage, then, after realizing that the conservatives were a large part of their customer base, they did a 180 and publicly cut ties with the influencer thereby also alienating the customers they hoped to gain in the first place while also not gaining back much of their conservative customers.
Someone feel free to fact check me I'm drawing on memory here.
Eh you are forgetting the spot where the conservative snowflakes also just started buying different beer from anheuser-busch because they don't know how companies are structured and thought bud light was a whole company. They haven't lost money here just the share of money coming from bud light in north America has shifted to other beers they own.
I know some locally who switched to Coors not realizing Coors was one of the first Pride beer sponsors (with Miller Lite), all because of a single gay teamster.
https://teamster.org/2017/06/teamsters-pride-work-look-back-coors-boycott/
You realize it's just more rage bait right? The parent company here complaining has seen increased growth in subsidiaries like Corona because the lot getting bent out of shape over bud light just bought other bear made by the same parent company. They didn't lose money it's just coming from different beers now. Fuck the wall street noise here
I don't just grab anything thing, but the thing.
I just hate Budweiser, not the company… the product.
The Czech Budvar is nice. Sullied name though.
I mean they pissed off the only people willing to drink their dog shit excuse for alcohol.
Amazingly, they ended up pissing off both sides.
First, they pissed off the transphobes.
Then, they pissed off everyone else by acquiescing to the bigots and pulling the ad campaign.
An absolutely moronic series of business decisions.
That's what I like to see.
Yep, the other comments trying to explain away the drop are just sour grapes.
Terrible business decision.
They are not even trying. All their tv commercials are now for Modello. Same company.
Modelo is AB InBev outside the US. Inside the US, it’s Constellation Brands, which is totally different company. So it’s not the same company in the US.
Why are "conservatives" so weak willed, and need to belong to a team?
They have nothing else to be proud of. Such awful people that will blame an "other" instead of looking inward.
The only reason I've ever bought bud light is because of the trans support.
like sex in a canoe, fucking close to water.
This is quite offensive to water.
Oh no, somehow revenue dropping 13.5% revenue is bad.
Right wingers hated the decision a lot. Bud Light did not want to lose customers so they caved.
And in trying to save the transphobe dollar, they pissed off everyone else. Maybe this will teach companies to just support them and ignore what the right wing/transphobes (I know, I repeat myself) complain about, because you know you can't count on them once you capitulate.
How does no article seem to get this? I was geared up to buy cases of bud light for my 4th of July bash, explicitly because of the conservative reaction to that event. I don't even like Bud Light generally, though I'll admit a cold Bud Light Lime in the summertime can be refreshing. Then Anheuser-Busch fired the people responsible and backtracked.
Nope.
Now you have lost the business of the bigots and the allies, Anheuser-Busch, well fucking played. You deserve this "hardship" (which we all know is a blip at most) for having no fucking spine and caving to bigots.
Who exactly is everyone else?
Seems like bud light is the meathead beer for jocks at college parties or cookouts.
Companies should just stay out of politics. No matter the position they take, they will be alienating customers.
That's a position only the privileged can take.
I remember when the left was railing against corporations and working to limit their reach in politics. Not begging them for validation and pushing them to be more involved in politics.
There's a difference between taking a stance on social issues and bribing a government official.
Smart business move.
I’m never going to purchase Bud Lite again.
Because it’s terrible and I’m not an alcoholic.
Are they even selling it anywhere else?
As someone who lives in Europe who never tried USA made beer, are they really that bad? Can you compare to anything from Europe?
It’s bad to beer snobs/craft bros, but to most normal people it’s refreshing when served cold. Not much flavor going on with BL, but most people who drink it aren’t looking for pumpkin spice or hops or whatever in their beverage - they just want a cold beer that’s smooth and refreshing.
I'm not too picky with beer and am happy to try anything, from crappy macros to the local brew pub's experiment with jalapenos. For me, these macro lagers serve the same function as soda but aren't as sweet. They're just something to wash down pizza or Chinese food while I'm watching a movie. Yes, there are "craft" sodas that cost a lot of money but Shasta is cheaper and gets the job done.
I can see how that would be a thing. My father likes drinking some local beer that is basically equal to drainage water. On the other hand I like German or Czech lager, depending on the mood. He usually doesn't touch my beer saying it's too expensive for his taste. Not sure how 1$ for good 0.5l beer is too expensive for 0.7$ garbage but am not going to argue with him. He actually prefers beer that I drink and enjoys it when he runs out of bad stuff. It's just that he keeps buying that garbage.
Sometimes you just want the drunk more than the drink, so you don't care if it tastes anywhere between piss and a Sharpie.
Hm. I have gin and whiskey for that. But to each his own I suppose. :D
Craft brews here can be bloody amazing. The big name mass produced domestics tend to be watery, with little pleasantness to the flavor. Some are God awful, but most are the beer equivalent of a plain potato chip. Pleasant enough in the moment, but you'll forget about it not long after.
Kind of like Stella or Heineken? Bland but good enough.
Add 30% more water to a glass of Heineken and you'll be close enough to bud light.
Okay, that sounds gross. Am not even sure I want to imagine.
Stella or Heine are both flavorful, wonderful drinks compared to Bud Light, that's how bad it is.
Why would anyone buy that?
Edit: Leaving the message up, but Stella is NOT Mexican. No friggen clue where I got that from o.o
Funny you mention a Dutch and Mexican brew, but basically lol. I find Heineken better tasting than Bud, Miller, Coors, what have ya, but it's not a huuuge bump in quality. Plus Heineken in my area isn't that much cheaper than the much better tasting, much more varied craft brews I can find locally.
We are not talking about price. But yeah, both of those are known and mass produced okay beers that are just okay.
...
Aight this prompted me to look into it. Dunno where the HELL I got Mexican from, gonna make a note of it lol
Bud light is awful. It's watered down and barely has a flavor. American beer is not bad in general anymore, but it definitely used to be. This is one of the beers from the hayday of shitty American beer.
I like Mexican beers in the summer. They have significantly different and lighter taste than what we have here, but with lemon they are very refreshing. Is it the same kind of lighter taste or even more watered down?
It's like that, but minus flavor.
Ouch.
Nah, it's got like no flavor at all
Am finding it incredibly worrying that so many people are on point with explanation like "minus the flavor". Now I don't even want to try it, not even out of curiosity.
You aren't missing anything
Bud Light was already a joke for being bad.
American Light Macro-Lagers are popular because they're cheap. But if you want to try one I'd recommend Coors Light over Bud Light. Also the US is hotter and a light beer is best when you've been out in 100°F heat for a while.
But if you want something better there are tons of other breweries all around the country. You'd probably have a hard time getting anything from the smaller ones in europe but you can probably get something from one of the larger ones like Shiner.
Yep. GTA 4 came out in 2008 - 15 years ago - and features the beer brand "Pißwasser", which is clearly mocking Budweiser's name and branding - particularly Bud Light's. It's been a joke for a long time.
Hmm, Greece, Italy and Spain would like a word with Minnesota, Wyoming and Maine. And let's not even mention Alaska
For some reason I was picturing they were in the UK
Yep UK's certainly not sweltering, although we have gone over 100f on five occasions, all in the last 3 years (and all in the south east of England which is our warmest region)
What's the humidity been on those occasions? I assume being an island it's somewhat humid but since the water around y'all is probably colder than the Gulf of Mexico I'd think that would mitigate it some.
I couldn't say scientifically but it's generally not felt that humid. We do get what we call 'muggy' days where you can feel a storm brewing, but often the hottest days are drier.
I've experienced real heat and humidity in Northern Australia and we never get those levels in the uk.
American/Canadian lagers are basically fizzy rice water with a little bit of alcohol in them. It's not beer as a European would know it. I've had and made plenty of lagers, lager can be tasty, bodied and still refreshing. The only thing these have going for them is the latter.
So accent is not to drink pure water, but have something going on and ability to get pissed?
Pretty much. And they're drinking "light" beer because they're already fat bastards. They'd be better off with a sodastream and some gin if they want to get refreshed, drunk and skinny.
Yep. Even some local lagers have been disappointing to me... your standard options are way better in Europe than anywhere here vis-a-vis. Just like Canadian healthcare, us Canucks can say at least we're slightly better with our beers than the US.
Don't count on my word for taste of beer though, stuff enough hops in it and I'm a happy camper...
The macro brewed stuff is about as bad as any other macro brew like Carlsberg or Stella Artois. There are tons of good locally/regionally brewed beer though which comes in any manner of styles.
If I had to choose between Bud and Stella I would be torn because I'm not sure which one is worse 🤔
Not sure if joking or not, because Stella is miles better than budlite. Might still be bad, but it's not even in the same stratosphere as budlite.
Stella is grooosss.
Sure. Budlite is still worse.
They're basically the same product in different packaging, at least to my palate.
I doubt it has anything to do with the taste...
Yeah, this is one of those cases of not knowing your own market. While what they did was laudable in a general sense, they should have also realized their core demographic is heavily conservative and that such a move was highly likely to hurt them far more than it would benefit them.
Bud in general and Bud Light in particular is just the worst kind of swill. It's only redeeming quality is being cheap.
That's really overselling what it was. They made ONE can with the special print, the also made a number of other special cans for other influencers that weren't "woke". This was supposed to be a quiet nod to the LGBTQ+ community, which also drinks a reasonable amount of bud light, just like the rainbow tap handle my local gay bar has for it on tap.
How or why the right-wing outrage machine landed on this as the outrage du jour, who knows? But they and most major brands do stuff like this all the time, they just got really unlucky.
Also worth noting, beer sales in general, and especially big brand light lagers have been declining. Attributing all of Bud Lights decline to this one instance ignores a lot of other trends.
Yeah I honestly wouldn’t be surprised if this was calculated to coincide with the decline. It’s a nice easy win to call for a boycott of something of declining popularity.
How was it laudable? They caved to the bigots nearly immediately and fired the folks responsible.
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/04/25/business/bud-light-dylan-mulvaney.html
I meant the original move, not the immediate backtracking. They started from a laudable position by at least attempting to be somewhat inclusive, then of course immediately fucked it up once their quarterly profits looked like they might take a hit.
Fair enough - it's a personal pet peeve of mine that the backtracking rarely gets mentioned (as backtracking) in coverage of the event.
Target didn't do much better, IMO.
I think they just didn't appreciate our current media environment well enough. They thought they could try to expand sales to new customers with a TikTok ad campaign that their core consumers would never see. What they didn't plan for was the fact that right-wing "news" has become pure Christian nationalist grievance propaganda that scours social media for anything they can use to outrage their audience; they didn't expect that their little TikTok ad campaign would become the biggest story in the right-wing outrage ecosystem for weeks.
If they didn't expect that their head has been in the same for eons. I think this is the leadership of the company making decisions based on their environment and what investors wanted. They knew it would piss off the right. They assumed the right was irrelevant.
Which might be true in like 40 years, but for now the kids they're appealing to aren't drinking beer. Hell. The way trends are going they never will. Alcohol to my knowledge isn't nearly as popular as it was, and people see it for what it is among the younger generations.
No amount of rainbows and trans influencers will convince people to start drinking poison. But your average idiot with no sense of the consequences of their actions?
Guess who they tend to vote for.
If you look there’s plenty of cheap beers that taste at least a little better. When I was in college in the 00s I’d drink Lion’s Head for like $10 a case.
Plus they had little puzzles under the caps so it’s got more value.
Hmm fair enough. Its only redeeming quality then is being cheap and well known. Really there's no good reason to drink Bud, even before they pulled this stunt they were crap.
The cheap Bud Light analogue is Natural Light.
Is that the reason, or is it because it's flavourless pisswater?
Americans realising it came out the tap the whole time
If the only choice is Bud Light, I will just have water. Bud Light and Coors Light are just the worst beers I can imagine. Not even worth considering. I'd just as soon be 100% sober then drink one.
Both of those are still better than Miller Lite.
Not by an amount that is meaningful. You can toss them all into the trash where they belong.
Miller Lite is so disgusting, I used it as a drinking cessation aid, the first time I quit cold turkey and had terrible night terrors, the 2nd and hopefully final time I quit, i slowly stepped down with decreasing sized tall boys of Miller Lite till I switched over to delicious Non Alcoholic IPA's. Was still hard, but easier with how disgusting Miller Lite is, the only beer that is more disgusting is Rolling Rock, but unfortunately it doesnt come in 6 different sizes of tall boys.
The beer I hate the most is Michelob Ultra. It's not even that it's gross, it's not that notable, I've had beers that made me want to vomit. MU is just so boring, it's so bland it's not even refreshing. If it was disgusting I could dismiss it at just "not my thing" but there was just nothing notable. If beer was body language, MU would be a shrug.
The most disgusting beer I've had was St Arnolds 5 O'clock Pills.
Miller Lite is fine. It's not great its just fine. Even says so on the label!
You must not have had a lot of beers if those are the worst beers you can imagine. It’s a low abv light lager, there’s a time and place. Like floating or tailgating. It certainly doesn’t taste foul, just doesn’t taste like much.
Del's black cherry shandy. I bought them because I love the lemon, but they were out of lemon. The black cherry tastes like cough syrup.
I still drank them, no point in wasting them. But I'm never buying them again.
The worst beer is called Name Tag from Trader Joe's. I couldn't even finish one as a joke. I thought it might have gone bad so I opened another and it was the same. I ended up tossing the whole 6 pack. Some beer is crap and I'm just not that desperate.
Good point. I'm not a fan of BL, but I will choose it over almost any craft beer I've had.
That shit is just bonkers. No wonder it doesn't sell volume.
I'm not against Dylan Mulvaney or any other trans person, but what did Bud Light expect? Did they think that appealing to the lgbt community and its supporters would garner more sales? The fact of the matter is their beer is trash and the only people that seem to still drink it are people that clearly are either neutral on or actively against trans rights. This is a textbook case of not knowing your demographic.
They've been marketing to the queer community for years now. They were probably expecting business as usual.
Idk what you mean. They've been working the queer community for a long while now. It's only this specific thing really that conservatives got mad over, cause one asshole talking head covered it as if it was the end of the world.
They also pissed off a bunch of the people they were hoping to market toward by just leaving Dylan out on their own after the fact.
It sucks that, in this situation there are sides, but “picking a side” in the debate, realizing you made people mad and responding by sticking your head in the sand is a great way to piss off everyone that cares. Either they really don’t care and did it as a marketing stunt or they did care until it affected their money. Either way, they showed just how soulless AB is.
They should've known that americans aren't ready to accept human rights
Their market is, in fact, everyone with a mouth that is of age to consume alcohol. Appealing to consumers across demographics is literally how they became the top selling beer in the first place. I've lost track of the number of pride events I've seen them sponsor over the years. A savvy company would have siezed the opportunity to show a shared enjoyment of product across demographics.
Yeah, I think they really should've just stayed out of the whole thing altogether or just stuck to small token gestures, if they weren't going to actually try to change their beer at all.
Most people that are supportive of the LGBT community probably weren't drinking Bud Light to begin with. They're more likely to be "beer snobs", more discerning, more likely to be the crowd going for craft brews, less generic brands, maybe even staying away from beer altogether. They would more likely equate Bud Light to piss, worse than just having a water.
The MAGA crowd on the other hand, probably grew up with their parents drinking Bud Light, so that's what they're going to drink, because that's what good ol' American boys drink when watching sports and nascar and whatever else. As long as Bud Light didn't rock the boat, they were a staple brand for "honest, hard-working Americans".
They sent a 6 pack of special cans to one person. They didn't market they were doing it. They didn't sell them. They didn't do an entire canning run of the special cans for some event. They did almost the bare minimum. And your response is they should have "stuck to small token gestures." If giving a 6 pack of cheap beers to one person isn't a token gesture, I don't know what is.
Only now did 'Muricans realise the product itself sucks due to that promo?
Well, at least this is not hitting the sales of real beer.
i like lager beers but bud/budlight is just awful. it's water pretending to be beer.
Excuse me but that's disrespectful to water.