Deliberately alienating your core customer base is not the best strategy for operating a profitable business.
One large corporation that has gone fully woke is now learning this the hard way.
And now Anheuser-Busch distributors are panicked after this report revealed the extent of the unprecedented backlash to Bud Light’s “woke” stunt.
Bud Light sales have plummeted in the wake of a controversial ad campaign that threatens to send shockwaves up and down the beer company’s supply line.
Anheuser-Busch distributors across the nation are “spooked” by the public backlash.
It all started when Bud Light chose divisive transgender activist Dylan Mulvaney to be their spokesperson to celebrate the biological male’s one year of “womanhood.”
“This month I celebrated my day 365 of womanhood and Bud Light sent me possibly the best gift ever — A can with my face on it!” Mulvaney said in a video announcing the endorsement deal.
But the response from Bud Light distributors and customers has been overwhelmingly negative, with many even dropping Anheuser-Busch products altogether.
“We reached out to a handful of [Anheuser-Busch] distributors who were spooked, most particularly in the Heartland and the South, and even then in their more rural areas,” Beer Business Daily insider said.
“We dispense with any discussion of politics or social issues but note that the publication stated that some distributors in the Heartland and South were increasingly cautious given negative consumer reaction,” Trust Equity research director Michael Roxland said.
Nevertheless, an Anheuser-Busch executive defended the partnership with Dylan Mulvaney.
“Anheuser-Busch works with hundreds of influencers across our brands as one of many ways to authentically connect with audiences across various demographics and passion points,” the executive said. “From time to time we produce unique commemorative cans for fans and for brand influencers, like Dylan Mulvaney. This commemorative can was a gift to celebrate a personal milestone and is not for sale to the general public.”
Whether connecting with these new “audiences across various demographics and passion points” was alienating the existing core customer base was left unsaid, but the early trends haven’t been good for the company.
“I’m a businesswoman, I had a really clear job to do when I took over Bud Light, and it was ‘This brand is in decline, it’s been in a decline for a really long time, and if we do not attract young drinkers to come and drink this brand there will be no future for Bud Light,” Marketing VP Alissa Heinerscheid said in an interview last month. “We had this hangover, I mean Bud Light had been kind of a brand of fratty, kind of out-of-touch humor, and it was really important that we had another approach. Representation is sort of at the heart of evolution, you have got to see people who reflect you in the work.”
Bud Light’s VP Alissa Heinerscheid said to save declining brand she had to attract young drinkers with having inclusive campaign that appeals to men and women.
Obviously, featuring a man pretending to be a woman didn’t appealed to neither sex. pic.twitter.com/NwV38CBaQb
— I Meme Therefore I Am 🇺🇸 (@ImMeme0) April 9, 2023
The astonishing thing is, based on that statement, it’s really difficult to avoid concluding that the marketing VP simply doesn’t like those who have been buying the product that pays her salary.
Over the last week, Anheuser-Busch has seen its stock price fall by roughly 4%, causing the company to lose over $6 billion in market capitalization.
Distributors aren’t the only ones who have been spooked by all this.
With the overwhelmingly negative reaction to their ad campaign, Bud Light has not made a social media post since April 1.
US Political Daily will keep you updated on any developments to this ongoing story.
