It appears that the boycott of Bud Light by conservatives who have had enough of woke companies pushing their agenda into every aspect of American life is working.
Despite removing the executives who made the disastrous mistake, the beer brand appears to have become completely tarnished.
Barrons wrote, “Beer Business Daily reported Sunday that Bud Light’s off-premise sales volume–the amount of beer sold outside of restaurants and bars–was down 26.1% from a year earlier in the week ended April 22, based on scan data. Volumes were down 21.1% in the prior week, while so far this year, Bud Light volumes are down 8%.
The figures include sales at grocery stores, convenience stores, and liquor stores.
“The shocking deterioration of Bud Light Blue’s market share continued apace through the third week of April–and actually somehow worsened. We’ve never seen such a dramatic shift in national share in such a short period of time,” Beer Business Daily wrote on its website.
Bud Light has been dealing with the fallout from a social media promotion for its Bud Light beer featuring Mulvaney, a transgender influencer. The promotion prompted a backlash from conservatives on social media and hurt sales of Bud Light, particularly in red states.”
Now, the maker of Bud Light is working desperately to not only try and repair its relationship with customers, but also with distributors who have taken a huge hit because of the company’s woke misstep.
Anheuser-Busch InBev, the country’s largest brewer, has pledged to boost its marketing spending on Bud Light, accelerate production of a new slate of ads, and give a case of Bud Light to every employee of an Anheuser-Busch wholesaler,” distributors told The Wall Street Journal.
“The efforts are continuing a month after Dylan Mulvaney, a transgender social-media star, spoke in an Instagram video about a personalized can of Bud Light that the brewer had sent her as a gift. The April 1 post sparked a boycott that caused sales to plummet for both Anheuser-Busch and its independently owned distributors. The distributors’ employees, many of whom drive trucks bearing the Bud Light logo, were confronted by angry people on streets, in stores and in bars.
‘It sent shock waves through distributors,” said Jeff Wheeler, vice president of marketing for Del Papa Distributing near Houston, Texas, where he said his administrative staff fielded “tons of phone calls from people being very hateful.’
As the backlash mounted, Del Papa posted a statement on Facebook, saying Anheuser-Busch worked with hundreds of influencers and that the local distributor had no control over the brewing giant’s marketing decisions. “We too are upset with this situation and have been vocal about it with the top leadership at Anheuser-Busch,” Del Papa’s statement said.
‘They didn’t need to take this risk,’ one distributor said, adding that he was worried the brand might now swing back in the other direction. ‘I lost my cowboy bars and now I could lose my gay bars, too.’
If the boycott keeps going, Bud Light may soon get knocked off its pedestal as America’s number one beer. “Figures released by Bump Williams Consulting, a firm that specializes in the alcohol beverage market, found Bud Light sales have progressively slumped throughout the month of April. In the second week of the month, they were down 11 percent and plummeted 21 percent the following week,” according to The National Review.”
“Overall sales are now reportedly down 8 percent on the year, jeopardizing parent company Anheuser-Busch InBev’s position as the market leader.
‘I think it runs the risk of losing that No. 1 position at the end of calendar year 2023 to Modelo Especial,’ Bump Williams, the market research company chief, told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch on Monday.
According to the marketing executive, sales have increased for Bud Light competitors — namely, Miller Lite and Coors Light — amid the controversy.
‘Right now their compass is completely broken. There’s no game plan,’ Williams concluded.”
[Read More: China Begins Targeting American Companies]
