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New reports indicate that a highly effective boycott of Bud Light cost parent company Anheuser-Busch up to $1.4 billion following the brand's collaboration with transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney in a partnership in April last year.
Anheuser-Busch loses $1.4 billion
On Thursday, Anheuser-Busch InBev (BUD) reported record revenue for 2023, admitting that its “full growth potential was constrained” by its U.S. business, with sales hurt by a Bud Light boycott triggered by the Mulvaney partnership, CNN reported. . .
Last year, organic revenue in North America declined by $1.4 billion, as beer sales declined significantly by volume, largely due to lower Bud Light sales in the United States. This is devastating news for AB InBev, where beer makes up the vast majority of its revenue.
“In the US, performance remains very disappointing with revenues declining at double-digit rates as the group loses market share,” Arin Chekri, equity analyst at online investment platform Hargreaves Lansdown, said on Thursday morning.
RELATED: Bud Light humiliated as it loses crown as best-selling Super Bowl beer to Mexican Corona
The former Anheuser-Busch exec is speaking out
Anson Frericks, former chief operating officer of Anheuser-Busch, Bud Light's parent company, told Fox Business earlier this month that the brand was having a hard time winning back consumers because Anheuser-Busch wasn't asking customers to “come back to them.”
“They didn't do a good job of getting out of that trench at all,” Frericks said. “Your sales are still down 30% weekly, even though last summer they spent three times their planned marketing budget on Bud Light.”
Watch him talk more about this in the video below.
Last summer, Frericks admitted that Bud Light made a “mistake” in collaborating with Mulvaney.
“[Bud Light] It was the biggest brand in the United States because it was remarkably apolitical. “It was always about sports, it was always about music, it was about bringing people together. That's why it was wrong for them to do this campaign in the first place because they couldn't get out.”
“This campaign was a mistake,” Frericks continued. “Anheuser-Busch will not do campaigns like this moving forward. We will return to things that bring everyone together. Hopefully that will protect jobs at Anheuser-Busch, jobs at wholesalers and get this company back in the right direction.”
Frericks concluded by calling on Anheuser-Busch executives to “go back to what Bud Light has always been, which is a great beer that was cool to drink at football games and didn't necessarily become part of the discussion.”
RELATED: Kid Rock Retracts Bud Light Video That Goes Viral – 'Tantrum With a Machine Gun'
Trump calls for 'second chance' for Bud Light
Earlier this month, former President Donald Trump called on his supporters to give Bud Light a “second chance.”
“The Bud Light ad was a mistake of epic proportions, and a heavy price has been paid for it, but Anheuser-Busch is not a Woke Company, but I can give you a lot of it,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform.
“Anheuser-Busch is a great American brand that maybe deserves a second chance?” Trump later added. “What do you think? Maybe, instead, we should go after those corporations looking to destroy America!”
However, the latest reports from Anheuser-Busch indicate that Trump's endorsement has done little to change the situation when it comes to convincing consumers to return to Bud Light. Ultimately, Bud Light made a huge mistake when it teamed up with Mulvaney, and it's becoming clear that the brand may never be able to recover from it.
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