Bud Light brewer is still struggling to sell the beer in North America over trans promotion backlash
Bud Light brewer is still struggling to sell the beer in North America over trans promotion backlash
Anheuser-Busch Inbev says that revenue growth in most of its global regions was offset by a drop in North American sales.
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.
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
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.
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.
...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.
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 thing 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...The only reason I've ever bought bud light is because of the trans support.
InBev’s net income rose 4% to $5.4 billion, or 86 cents per share. That was ahead of the 84 cents Wall Street expected, according to FactSet.
Oh no, somehow revenue dropping 13.5% revenue is bad.
Are they even selling it anywhere else?
I doubt it has anything to do with the taste...
Is that the reason, or is it because it's flavourless pisswater?
Americans realising it came out the tap the whole time
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.
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.
I’m never going to purchase Bud Lite again.
Because it’s terrible and I’m not an alcoholic.
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.
CAN WE PLEASE LET NESTLE CONTRACT ALL THE TRANNIES?
The world needs them to go bankrupt. Reminds me to look for the lemmy anti nestle sub :)
Good