Around this time in 2023, Bud Light started a marketing firestorm when it partnered with transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney and then seemed to distance itself from the relationship amid backlash. The fallout continues to smolder.
Global mentions of Bud Light across social networks such as X, Reddit and Instagram surpassed 800,000 during the week of April 10-17, 2023, according to consumer intelligence platform Talkwalker. For context, those seven days saw more mentions of the beer brand than the entire first quarter of 2023.
The discussion wasn’t limited to social media, either. Company executives and analysts uttered the words “Bud Light” 56 times during parent company Anheuser-Busch InBev’s quarterly earnings calls last year. That’s up from just two times in 2022.
Despite more than doubling its annual ad spend—from $61.4 million in 2022 to $131.7 million in 2023—Bud Light couldn’t seem to win back customers. As the year came to a close, more members of the general public held a negative impression of the brand than positive. This wasn’t the case prior to Bud Light’s partnership with Mulvaney.
Revenue has also suffered. AB InBev reported its North American sales came to $15.1 billion in 2023, down 9% compared with 2022. That amount is lower than any year during the pandemic, when people couldn’t even order beer at bars and concert halls because the doors were closed.
This story first appeared in the April 2, 2024, issue of Adweek magazine. Click here to subscribe.
