Radio personality Howard Stern said he’s “dumbfounded” at all the hullabaloo, wondering on air, with regard to Kid Rock and [Travis] Tritt, “Why do you care so much?” ...
“These are tough brands to find growth for — Bud Light has been shedding barrels of volume for years. It’s past its prime, it will not be the largest beer in the country much longer,” [said beer columnist Dave Infante]. “This is standard-issue pinkwashing stuff. They’re looking for ways to quote-unquote align their values with customer segments that they think maybe they can still find some loyalty in.”...
"Pinkwashing" connotes that the effort is superficial and fake. That is, it's advertising. There's no serious commitment to underlying principles.
"Why do you care so much?" — Stern asked — but the advertiser is always asking you to care — care, but only just enough. Don't under- or over-care. Care the amount that makes you like the product and want to buy it. It's hard to calibrate! Remember when Pepsi miscalculated?*
Some of that traditional core audience, even though it’s not growing, feels betrayed by Bud Light’s LGBTQ outreach and alliance, however small, with a trans woman. They feel like it’s gone “woke,” like another part of the country’s culture is changing around them in a way that’s uncomfortable.
“You’re talking about a demographic that’s drinking that beer here locally that’s about as far from that as you can get. You’re talking about some blue-collar working men. Women don’t drink that beer a lot or just in general, and sure, they just kind of struck a nerve with their base, potentially,” Don, the liquor store owner, said.
_______________________
* See "Pepsi Pulls Ad Accused of Trivializing Black Lives Matter" (2017, NYT).
Pepsi has apologized for a controversial advertisement that borrowed imagery from the Black Lives Matter movement, after a day of intense criticism from people who said it trivialized the widespread protests against the killings of black people by the police....
The ad, posted to YouTube on Tuesday, shows attractive young people holding milquetoast signs with nonspecific pleas like “Join the conversation.” The protesters are uniformly smiling, laughing, clapping, hugging and high-fiving. In the ad’s climactic scene, a police officer accepts a can of Pepsi from Kendall Jenner, a white woman, setting off raucous approval from the protesters and an appreciative grin from the officer.
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110 comments:
Kudos for the word 'voxsplaining'
Wow, she do go on! Too much time and money on their hands. We should count our blessings that any of this baloney preoccupies anybody. (If it does.)
Voxsplaining is usually a carefully crafted lie. Look- if you want to see the effect of the ad campaign, we will know in short order based on sales alone. The tone of the article is that there is no such thing as bad publicity, but that is an untruth.
Bud Light has been shedding barrels of volume for years. It’s past its prime, it will not be the largest beer in the country much longer,”
yep! if (IF!) it loses (more than!) HALF of its sales, it will down to second place.
Which, APPARENTLY, is what the VP of marketing was driving for?
I love watching people frame the backlash and rationales from their own perspective and fitting into their own prejudices of others.
This is the funniest sentence I'll read all week:
"Emily Stewart covers business and economics for Vox and writes the newsletter The Big Squeeze, examining the ways ordinary people are being squeezed under capitalism."
The "confusion" about the reaction seems so disingenuous. The marketing decision was made specifically to court an audience based on resonation with a political perspective (Alissa Heinerscheid has openly said the goal is to convert younger more progressive consumers). If the marketing message is also discordant with the political perspective of another audience, shouldn't it be expected that it would alienate that audience? There are plenty of companies and products that those on the left go out of their way to not support because their politics don't align. It's only silly and confusing when the left-aligned company is the target of the protest.
"Why do you care so much?" — Stern asked
Note the question only goes one way. No one would dare ask the question of why Bud Light "cared" enough to make the cans in the first place.
This is why the question isn't really about "caring" but of pushing back against the resistance.
Stern is using civility bullshit here.
If the write-up below is true, Bud may have a New Coke debacle on their hands. Sales are said to be off by 70% to 80% in some locations, with remaining buyers unware of the social media developments:
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/bar-owner-says-customers-have-stopped-ordering-bud-light-after-trangender-ad-campaign
A lot of branding is image. Regular guys wearing jeans, Ray-Ban sunglasses, and a flag T-shirt but holding a can of Bud Light now show political support for people they do not resemble, lifestyles they find repulsive, people they would never socialize with and who vote against them, and who want to take their assets in the name of equity. This is why most brands never took a political position before Wokeism and Trump.
Bud's biggest risk may be that regulars try other beers and discover that watered-down rice beer doesn't taste very good and isn't worth a price premium over a cheap discount beer. They'll either upgrade to a better brand or save money with Pabst Blue Ribbon.
Bud's marketing team responds: "We had to destroy the village to save it."
Not drinking Bud Light is not political. It’s a matter of common sense.
I find the 'whats all this nonsense about" reponse so lame. And Howard Stern? Really? That ugly freak doesn't drink beer. He smokes pot and if ever has alcohol, its $200 bottles of champagne since he's worth hundreds of $millions.
The Elite thing is to: (1) not drink beer unless its super-expensive craft beer and (2) love trannies. So of course, they and all the ones who want to be in the elites good graces play the "Gosh, what's everyone excited for?" game. Its like some internet troll: "why so mad, bro?"
Personally, I don't drink beer. But I don't feel superior to others who do. And I think EVERYONE should stop drinking Bud and Bud light. Stop supporting big corportions that hate normal people. They never were your friends, and they're now making their contempt clear.
But people - especially conservatives - always need some leader to tell them what to do, and keep kicking them in the butt before they'll change.
"These are tough brands to find growth for — Bud Light has been shedding barrels of volume for years."
Ineffible twaddle. Bud Light was and has been the #1 beer in America up until this point, beating its next highest competitor by 200% in distribution.
Another MSM lie.
Amazing that Howard Stern, a man who has been in hiding for years due to COVID, is dumfounded by things going on in the real world.
Also, Howard Stern, a man who was always at risk of losing sponsors due to his questionable content, is dumfounded by backlash to advertisers.
Is this the real Howard Stern, or did they just find someone off the street with the same name?
"Radio personality Howard Stern said he’s “dumbfounded” at all the hullabaloo, wondering on air, with regard to Kid Rock and [Travis] Tritt, “Why do you care so much?” ..."
You brought the subject up on your show. Why do you care so much?
"Why do you care so much?"
That's the standard line of attack, the implication being that you must be afraid - afraid that you're really gay and your secret will get out!
Surprised to see Stern take it up though. He must have sold out.
Anyway, it's long past time to start drinking better beer.
From news sites: "Bud Light's parent company has lost more than $6 billion in market capitalization since announcing its partnership with a polarizing transgender internet personality."
I suspect the shareholders care just a bit.
Mulvaney is a male "mansplaining" to women as to how they should really act if they want to be considered a woman. Leftist women are playing along and praising him for his deep insights and bravery. How condescending can one mid-20's male be before feminists tell him to "stay in his lane" since he knows nothing about being a woman and certainly not about how it is to be a pre-teen girl.
Not original to me, but corporations like Nike, Disney, and Apple use forced labor to produce the products that make them billions.
But every June they put a rainbow on their logos (except in the Middle East) and nobody cares.
This is about subversion of the culture and power.
The government tries make you accept that a man with a penis and testicles is actually a woman. It is naked power.
If a man can be a woman just by declaring it, why can't white people be black?
“ They feel like it’s gone “woke,” like another part of the country’s culture is changing around them in a way that’s uncomfortable. ”
It has clearly gone woke. Not a “feeling” but a fact. And the changing culture is not “uncomfortable” it is outrageous.
The worst kind of Deplorable is the Deplorable who realizes you are treating him as deplorable and reacts to it.
Clueless Howard Stern who abandoned terrestrial radio, abandoned his audience, fled COVID as if the Black Death were stalking America and turned into a Karen, is now asking people he doesn't understand or have any connection to why they care about remaining true to their respective brand image? Go ahead Howard, tell me you're out of touch with America in as few words as possible. File this under no shit sherlock.
Dude you used to be kid rock! Now you're the man.
Given that the lefties are bristles walking around waiting to be offended so they can dump on people and break stuff, the perspective expressed by Stern and the leftmediaswine is ridiculous.
Add in the scientific, political and moral bankruptcy of trans activism and it becomes monstrous. Mutilating and sexualizing children, victimizing women, mocking science, etc.? Is an ad campaign normalizing it really defensible in a decent society?
As for the lefty propaganda that Bud is just "riding the wave," maybe, but the distributors and bar owners don't seem to agree.
The only part of the trans movement that looks positive is that trans men may hoist on their own petard the silly, emotional, leftist women who are wreaking havoc on the country in universities, HR offices, Hollywood and voting booths. I do not include female athletes in that equation.
You can’t isolate this from the large context.
“ another part of the country’s culture is changing around them in a way that’s uncomfortable.”
That is a funny way of saying there are schools full of groomers trying to instill their values in your children and this company just told you to bend over and take it. There is the answer to why people care so much.
"Why do you care so much?"
The deplorables prefer not to care and be left alone. But the prog culture war forces them to care. Using beer as a vehicle for trans advocacy is an ideological middle finger. Message received.
Fake beer endorsed by a fake woman. Had enough, move on.
"Whee, our brand's in a national conversation! Next we'll shoot a spot with Kid Rock bumping into Dylan at a rap concert where they kinda stink-eye each other then trade their unopened cans of Bud Light! Psssch! Psssch!"
Beer is a fungible product, light beer especially so. What beer brands rely on, I suspect, is brand loyalty. You drink bud lite because you are a bud lite drinker. It may just be that it is a solved decision making problem where when beer is purchased it is bud lite.
AB has now given every bud lite drinker a reason to reevaluate this loyalty by making a political statement nit related to the product. They have attached something new to the brand and drinkers get to decide what the impact this change means.
Unfortunately for AB I think they have permanently destroyed a lot of brand loyalty which will not return. Changing beers is trivial and once made, the incentive to change again would need to be large to overcome the new brand inertia.
It is amusing to see someone like Stern, who cultivates a brand to get listeners, feign ignorance about all of this. Shows where he stands in this cultural fight.
We care because the left is shoving fake Tranny's down our throats. This idiot who pretends to be a 12 year old girl is a joke, as are all the people protecting it from the ridicule it deserves...and YES it deserves ridicule. It acts like a comic of what a girl acts like. And it is dumb and idiotic. Look at these previous videos and what an ass it acts like. I don't want to be associated with an ass like that. This is on the left. If this is okay, then Black face should be fine too. Not much of a difference.
Price is Right-
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eOQbCTCB5-A
Ellen show-
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kfulifuUBIM
AB Inbev is a massive conglomerate that has approximately 630 beer brands in 150 countries. It was a mistake to risk a major brand with this new strategy. The trick would have been to build up one of the lesser-known labels as a hot brand for today's confused kids, but I suppose each division had to increase its market share and Bud Light had the misfortune of having an idiot in charge of marketing.
Indeed, this wasn't supposed to be a major focus for Budweiser. It was intended to be a sideshow, but social media and the internet picked up on it and made it a major event. Beer has a low ceiling. You're not going to make beer the next wild fun thing, but Budweiser would have done well to concentrate on their traditional audience and try to make beer more attractive the the opiates that are killing so many.
Why should anyone care? I don't know, but Howard Stern isn't the one to ask such questions. His career is based on getting people to notice him and care about what he has to say, whether or not he has anything of value to offer. People do care, and companies have to take that into account.
It's a nice post, Althouse. I appreciate your thoughts, your 'cruel neutrality' perspective, and your short and sweet analysis.
Of course, it will be mostly wasted on many of your culture-warring commenters.
Stern doesn’t care about anything because he has no principles or honor. He was amusing to some as a vile shock jock but now that he has been shown to be a timid old woman over Covid even the people who used to like his gross out schtick no longer care what he has to say.
I have no idea what Kid Rock's problem is. I really don't think men have much of a dog in this fight. But, having watched a couple of her videos, I would be very angry if I was a woman who fought for equal rights only to see this ridiculous, over-the-top caricature that portrays women as ditzy bimbos. These are the stereotypes that women have been fighting forever and now they are being dusted off and *celebrated*. Are you shitting me?
Imagine being a serious female athlete and you watched Nike try to sell you athletic gear with a woman spokesperson saying things like "derpy derpy let me see if I can find other exercisie things to do!" Because, she is a girl. And we all know girls know nothing about fitness.
But, I am not a woman so this is not my fight.
"Why do you care so much" is always said by someone who is fine with something who can't understand why someone else isn't. It's repackaged "I'm right and you just don't get it". It's repackaged "shut up".
Kind of like, "Don't like abortions? Don't have one"
"Don't like gay marriage? Don't have one"
But of course, when people care, they care. People have valid opinions both for and against things. I could ask a lot of liberal people "Don't like Hobby Lobby's insurance plan? Don't work there. Why do you care so much?"
Don't like it that a baker in Colorado won't make gay wedding cakes? Don't go to him. "Why do you care so much?"
"Don't want student loans paid off? This isn't about you. Why do you care so much?"
People on both sides of cultural issues get to have opinions, and they are under no obligation to defer to the side that is *for *something.
Howard Stern went left years ago. I used to listen but no more.
If the purpose of the advertising was to sell Bud Light, the advertising failed. Perhaps the advertising was more successful in its ulterior aims, although no one can quite identify what those ulterior aims were. In any event, Dylan Mulvaney has achieved true fame. Perhaps he can marry one of the Kardashians or tour as a back up dancer with that other Dylan.
Let's pretend there's not an epidemic of "gender dysphoria" and a rush to child mutilation.
It's just a silly branding misstep.
Yup.
Hey,
How're we doing on that manifesto?
What manifesto?
Exactly.
One of my production gig platforms had a seminar on how to utilize pronouns to make your profile more marketable.
Just branding, I'm sure.
“Why do you care so much?”
The question makes more sense when it's aimed back at the likes of Howard Stern and Emily Stuart. Why do you, who are demographically speaking not Bud Light drinkers, care?
I am also not a Bud or any other kind of light beer drinker, but it's pretty obvious why longtime consumers of the brand would feel betrayed. A brand is built-up over time by quality, consistency, availability and memorable advertising. It gains cachet and commands a price premium from these efforts. If you debase a brand, loyal customers will feel like they don't matter.
Maybe it's sad and stupid, but it's also completely predictable to anyone who's taken marketing 101.
The aphorism claims there's no such thing as bad publicity. This may be true for Donald Trump, though I conclude that Trump's resilience is attributable to something much more profound than publicity, good or bad. However, one has reason to believe that the aphorism was coined by press agents to soothe away the panic of their clients and keep their income streams flowing whenever the inevitable bad publicity arises. The history of art, business, and politics in America is littered with the debris of bad publicity. Just ask Kevin Spacey, if you can find him.
If losing 30% of your retail sales is "riding a wave", then leaping off a tall skyscraper is flying in an exclusively downward direction.
I can support why I object to popular brands using Mulvaney to pitch their products regardless of whether I use the product or not. Mulvaney mocks and devalues women. To me, it's the equivalent of using a wife-beater to sell ice packs. But what excuse do you have for supporting the degradation of women? "Everybody does it" just doesn't cut it. Why do you accept this kind of abuse?
https://thecritic.co.uk/the-performance-of-a-lifetime/
I care because we are being asked (or told) not just to accept this stuff but to celebrate it and ignore basic truth. And a lot of it is being aimed at kids.
Shooting up beer cans because of it is a bit of an overreaction though.
"Why do you care so much?"
Because Mulvaney is an activist in support of biological males competing against girls in competitive sports, supports the use by biological males of girl high school locker rooms, supports biological males inclusion in rape crisis groups and domestic violence shelters, etc. It is perfectly reasonable for a consumer with brand loyalty to be disgusted by their brand giving away money to people like Mulvaney and associating the brand with such demented social positions.
It seems like the people at the retail level who actually sell the beer care. A lot.
Also Kid Rock and Travis Tritt care--very much--about their own brands.
Howard Stern still has a show?? Talk about burying the lede!
cfs said...
From news sites: "Bud Light's parent company has lost more than $6 billion in market capitalization since announcing its partnership with a polarizing transgender internet personality."
-----------
Care to share those "news sites" with us? Not saying it's not true, but a $6 billion loss seems a bit over the top for such a short period of time.
Vox...
In medicine, they would be called quacks.
Conservative cancel culture.
Personally I doubt Dylan is trans at all. I see a gay man approaching middle age who sees that the T part of LGBT is getting all the attention, so he starts a grift as a parody of a teenage girl.
I care because I think fetishizing mental illness is sadistic and an indicator of a declining society. I have children who are going to have to live in that society, so fuck Howard Stern and AB.
She’s saying:
“Nothing to see. Move along. Don’t worry. It will quickly blow over. Those stupid conservatives think that this is a cultural war. They are all haters. We’re better than that, and can show our love of all things LBGTxyz. Ok, maybe not the L(esbo) part right now, because trans people need to be able to take sports and girlfriends away from them.”
I see this as political postering pretending to be business reporting. Looking at last months figures, there’s nothing to worry about. Of course not - her figures were from before the Budcott began.
I'll add that MLB moving the All-Star game from Georgia because of Dem party pressure was a bit of a tipping point for me. I do care, and I'm not just going to watch Dem politics take over our whole society without caring. The Bud Light situation is a part of that. I don't know where all the money pushing the trans issue is coming from, but it serves the Democratic Party and not gay or even trans people, and not society at large.
I do think that's one big part of it. This isn't just about Bud or Dylan. It's about companies being pressured to be arms of the Democrat party, along with the rest of us.
Well, the change in market targeting comes with the new slogan...
I don't always drink Bud Light,
but when I do I take it in the can.
it looks like, in 2022 about TWO BILLION DOLLARS was spent on Bud Light..
And that number was "way down" from the previous years..
How did this marketing campaign help AB help those numbers?
Of the people in the country/world that AREN'T buying Bud Light, how many EVER will?
Of course, that wasn't The Important Thing, which was their Corporate Equality Index
https://reports.hrc.org/corporate-equality-index-2022?_ga=2.209484306.1654585067.1680806838-1276787822.1680719476#equality-fortune-companies
WSJ: I Helped Make Corporations Woke, and I Regret It
The politicization of everything is too high a price for the gay-rights advances of the 2010s.
Mason G said...You brought the subject up on your show. Why do you care so much?
D.D. Driver said...I have no idea what Kid Rock's problem is.
The difference in quality between lefty and non-lefty contributors here is stunning. Well said, Mason. Excellent point. To quote triple D in contrast, "I have no idea what your point is." Nor do we, trip. Although it is thoroughly ironic that your mock-confusion and Stern's are perfect bookends, a matched set one might say. Posers gotta pose.
Misogyny. Misandry. Transhumanism. Political congruence ("="). Pro-Choice religion. Some, Select [Black] Lives Matter (SS BLM)
That said, transgender visibility and promises without science, likely pushed that woman over the edge to open a mass abortion field including three children and three adults.
Voxsplaining is usually a carefully crafted lie
A handmade tale.
It would have been more effective for Bud Lite to do some serious introspection regarding why the brand is atrophying and what the customer base would want to reverse that trend. Unfortunately that would take some actual research and work, hence the Bud Lite marketing genius decided to take a less challenging route and just develop a bullshit advertising campaign based on a cultural freak and throw it out there. Budweiser sales are not going to recover because rice-based beer won't cut it anymore now that consumers have tasted actual beers brewed according to German purity standards, which is the way Budweiser was originally brewed before Busch stole the brand from it's original Czech developer and perverted its formula. I care for that reason and because Dylan is one more chip out of the social fabric of the country. Not sure how much more insanity the country can absorb.
i have never understood the need for "growth" to a company like Budweiser. Bud Light makes (made) a boatload of money for Budweiser. It may have been a decreasing boatload, but it's still an ocean liner. Every day, more money coming in the front door.
The entities that do need the growth are the executives who feel they need it to advance their career. Fine, but that should be a double edged sword. If the CEO has any brains, they need to fire the exec who lost Budweiser a lot of money just so she could personally advance.
I seem to recall some politician telling us "You will be made to care". At the time, I was thinking "No - you really, REALLY don't want me to start caring. You WANT me to be indifferent, because if I start caring you're likely NOT going to like how I'm going to think about the issue."
And... here we are. I don't want to care about Trans folk - you live your lives, I'll live mine, and if our paths cross I'll be polite but there's no way in hell I'm going to squeee and fangirl about how brave and stunning you are. Because I REALLY don't care about how you live your life. That's your business, that's your problem - it's neither something I care about or want to know about.
Until you get in my face and 'force me to care' - at which point I'm pretty much done being polite. You want to live like someone of the opposite gender? Then do so, pipe the hell down, don't expect praise for it.
IMO far, far too many trans folks who insist on being in the public eye are attention-seeking idiots. Mulvaney is a prime example - and the blatant stupidity of using him in womanface to promote any brand was bound to backfire. It takes a spectacularly insulated fool to think there's tons of people out there who will happily switch the beers they're drinking simply to emulate such a dysfunctional human.
Sadly, Bud Lite had one. And they're paying for it.
Lots of semi truths and distortions here IMO. My thoughts.
Is Bud Lite a long declining brand? Sure. As is all such beers. But they remain the King Kong of beers.
Is the Trans market enough to make a dent in that? Nope. And, even assuming Trans friendlies are counted, I doubt there will be a wave of young people drinking BL or any other such mass market beers.
Vox is pretending the gulf between these numbers is small. It is not.
Won't a lot of BL drinkers let this wave pass over them and continue to drink BL? I wonder. The anecdotal evidence seems pretty strong. And, even those that care not one wit about the Trans issue DO care about their buddy ribbing them about their beer selection.
Should I really care about Mulvaney? Nope. While he's the current "face" of the Transgendered, I doubt most in that actual community would agree with that assessment. He's more of a drag queen who has managed to find a character that has hit gold. He self advertises as a comic. He's got a hook.
"Why do you care so much?"
Because they do.
Trans-Can
"Coors made headlines back in 2007 when it took the idea of grabbing a cold one to the next level. In a stroke of marketing genius, the brand launched a new line of products with labels that changed color when refrigerated to the optimal temperature.
Spurred by sales growth resulting from the firm’s “Rocky Mountain Cold Refreshment” marketing focus, Coors collaborated with Inland Packaging to create the thermal-sensitive labels. This innovative feature made it easy to know when beer was too warm to serve, and the color signaled bartenders when it was time to offer patrons a new drink."
As has been noted, Mulvaney's stereotypical femme is purely performative and more offensive to women, trans or not, than to anyone else. He is basically a drag queen, except that drag queens know they are performing and let you know it, while Mulvaney knows he is performing but wants you to take him seriously.
Advertising is supposed to be aspirational. For the longest time, Bud had a class of ads featuring maybe half a dozen folks, better looking tenth of the next-door types, just barely looking old enough to drink, having great physical fun...mud football college quad, dodgeball in the lake, so forth. Since you can't drink the stuff on the ad, they'd be ostentatiously pulling a six-pack out of a cooler, dripping ice; opening one, tossing one to a friend. Who wouldn't want to be in that cohort? So the next time you see Bud, you get the good vibes back.
Ford, on the other hand, had a short-lived series featuring a divorced couple with kids. Sheesh. Seems, said a marketing guy, that an exec's wife watched the first and went 'awwww" as if seeing a black lab puppy. So they ran a bunch. Tanked totally. Real downer. Nobody wanted those vibes.
From time to time, Bud would run one where a guy gets a phone call early, before dawn. Goes to the Bud plant and starts the line running cans of potable water, presumably truck loads for an unnamed natural disaster. This appeals to the guy who'll show up when a neighbor's tree is across the driveway, and he brings a chain saw and not a phone to record it. Maybe a young guy in a high school VARSITY jersey shows up and throws the chunks into a pickup truck.
Or the guys who would be running their bass boats through the Harvey-flooded streets of Houston, evacuating a nursing home, while their wives are at such churches as expect to be above water and prepare food for the expected displaced.
Or the ones who enlist when need is.
They're not likely to be impressed by a self-referential freak show.
God to be something else as good as Bud and for about the same price.
I don't see the Bud Light drinkers returning as from a desert of self-denial, satisfied to have taught the fools a lesson. There's something else out there.
Between the backlash and the anti-backlash, only one costs ABinBev money. I think the only successful anti-back lash effort was the one that saw big purchase of the Dixie Chicks post anti-American comments album. The album many people estimate is the least played successful album, ever.
For lonejustice: The $6B AB link: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11967949/No-one-senior-level-aware-Bud-Light-partnering-trans-influencer-Dylan-Mulvaney.html.
Another: https://nypost.com/2023/04/12/anheuser-busch-down-5b-in-value-amid-dylan-mulvaney-bud-light-controversy/
Another: https://www.westernstandard.news/business/anheuser-busch-loses-over-6-billion-in-market-value-after-partnership-with-transgender-activist/article_48a47c7a-da02-11ed-bdd0-cfd034b4816b.html
JaimeRoberto writes, "Shooting up beer cans because of it is a bit of an overreaction though."
Nonsense! Blasting cases of Bud Light to smithereens with a full-auto MP5 is absolutely fitting and appropriate...
...as long as the debris is properly recycled.
Blogger BUMBLE BEE said...
Well, the change in market targeting comes with the new slogan...
I don't always drink Bud Light,
but when I do I take it in the can.
Perfect ! Fortunately my mouth was not full as I read that.
lonejustice said...
cfs said...
From news sites: "Bud Light's parent company has lost more than $6 billion in market capitalization since announcing its partnership with a polarizing transgender internet personality."
-----------
Care to share those "news sites" with us? Not saying it's not true, but a $6 billion loss seems a bit over the top for such a short period of time.
"Anheuser-Busch loses more than $5 billion in value amid Dylan Mulvaney Bud Light controversy"
https://nypost.com/2023/04/12/anheuser-busch-down-5b-in-value-amid-dylan-mulvaney-bud-light-controversy/
Stern turned into a crybaby bitch slowly then suddenly.
He started out as the fearless commentator who was afraid of no subject.
He made fun of everyone and reveled in his radical, disruptive persona.
Now he licks the boots of the far left progressives.
He's rich so he doesn't care, but he is a shadow of what he was...
'As has been noted, Mulvaney's stereotypical femme is purely performative and more offensive to women, trans or not, than to anyone else.'
He's not 'trans' anything except transvestite.
He is a man wearing women's clothes. It's a sexual kink.
He hasn't had genital surgery, nor do I think he ever will.
He's getting rich playing dress up off the backs of idiot corporations and liberal simps...
What @Chanie said at 9:42AM.
The VP of Marketing was quite clear that she wanted to shift their brand away from "fratty" and "out of touch" advertisement, which an is insult on many levels (for starters, most people I know that enjoy Bud Light never went to college and never joined a fraternal organization.
They don't drink beer as a status symbol, nor do they wish to promote someone else's status symbol. They are out of touch because they don't care that you want them to be in touch). For a person supporting DEI, she was intentionally being exclusionary. People don't like being excluded, and adding insults doesn't help. Why confusion and surprise that treating people in such a way, especially when they were your major patrons, causes a backlash.
If the write-up below is true, Bud may have a New Coke debacle on their hands.
I've seen this comparison mentioned a lot the last few days and to some extent, it may be true with regards to lost sales.
However, the creators of New Coke didn't deliberately go out of their way to jam their middle fingers into the eyes of their base customers. AB did.
How is it Howard Stern is still around? Remember how frat boy offensive he was? Don't women care? Also- How is it this Dylan person gets away with whatever it is he's doing? Don't women care?
Hard seltzer and craft beer are crushing it. American pilsner that tastes like bad water is way on the decline. Anheuser-Busch has some crappy me too brands in the space that can't compete with White Claw and the swarm of local craft providers. I suspect this In your face customers! brand realignment will help their demise along. Keep in mind ANY loss in market share is deadly to a brand, no matter how dominant they are. The forces that made the crack make the end...
I really don't understand why Blackface is a major mortal sin that can never be absolved, and Womanface is just all in good fun.
It's not. Mulvaney is a bona fide menace to society, and should be shunned. He is far more dangerous than, for example, Dave Chapelle. We can see that just from this comment thread.
For the sake of the argument, let's assume that those of us, whose view it is that trannies are a freak show manifestation of mental illness, are hateful clods. Life is like that. I'm a hateful clod and you are not....until it turns out that I think you are a hateful clod.
Why on earth would a beer company try to make a political statement that will bring the hateful clods to the surface of a decision-making sequence with respect to that company's beer products? One needs not ask "why do you care so much?". One must only acknowledge that a hateful clod is what a hateful clod does.
And it doesn't stop there. The market cap of the company has fallen by a few $ Billion in the aftermath since even those who aren't hateful clods AND the hateful clods can rightly assess that life is like that when it comes to public equities.
Lefties like that Heinerscheid cow are so blinded by their certainty of their moral superiority over us hateful clods and their impeccable virtue that it must come as a horrifying shock for her to see photos of her butt-ugly self all over the interwebs behaving so fratty in the past. I'm guessing that her tour of duty at the beer company will be soon coming to an unfortunate end.
- Krumhorn
The difference in quality between lefty and non-lefty contributors here is stunning. Well said, Mason. Excellent point. To quote triple D in contrast, "I have no idea what your point is." Nor do we, trip. Although it is thoroughly ironic that your mock-confusion and Stern's are perfect bookends, a matched set one might say. Posers gotta pose.
To paraphrase H.L. Mencken: someone, somewhere is living their lives differently than me. Who cares? The outrage ninnies on both side are exhausting. Like I said, if I were a women and somebody was mocking decades of struggle for *respect*, I would be pissed.
Explain to me why I should care about this. How does Bud Light hiring a moron spokesperson affect my life at all.
Are you a woman? Then why do you care? We call people that care about stuff that doesn't affect them "Karens." I'm not a Karen. Joe Rogan is not a Karen. Stern is a Karen just not on this issue.
These ads are literally kicking blue collar workers off the blue-progressive boat. If there was any doubt, the democrats are officially not the party of the working man or woman.
lonejustice said...
cfs said...
From news sites: "Bud Light's parent company has lost more than $6 billion in market capitalization since announcing its partnership with a polarizing transgender internet personality."
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Care to share those "news sites" with us? Not saying it's not true, but a $6 billion loss seems a bit over the top for such a short period of time.
_______
Here is three links:
https://www.westernstandard.news/business/anheuser-busch-loses-over-6-billion-in-market-value-after-partnership-with-transgender-activist/article_48a47c7a-da02-11ed-bdd0-cfd034b4816b.html
https://www.theepochtimes.com/anheuser-busch-lost-over-6-billion-in-market-value-after-transgender-controversy_5191711.html
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11967335/Bud-Lights-parent-company-Anheuser-Busch-InBev-lost-6-BILLION-market-cap.html
LLR-democratical and Violent Homosexual Rage Rape Fantasist Chuck: "Chuck said...
It's a nice post, Althouse. I appreciate your thoughts, your 'cruel neutrality' perspective, and your short and sweet analysis.
Of course, it will be mostly wasted on many of your culture-warring commenters."
For those paying attention over the last week, LLR-democratical Chuck has come out passionately for the radical trans agenda and supportive of David French's desire for drag queen shows in elementary schools. Chuck has even gone so far as to begin pushing the musings of pedophile enablers and those who defend "minor attracted people".
Context always matters.
Maybe zir's next stop is Heinz Baked Beans.
"Bud may have a New Coke debacle on their hands."
New Coke was a resounding success. Coca-Cola Classic sold more than the original original formula upon reintroduction.
Hey wait.
For the occassion, they could rename it Franken Beans
“And... here we are. I don't want to care about Trans folk - you live your lives, I'll live mine, and if our paths cross I'll be polite but there's no way in hell I'm going to squeee and fangirl about how brave and stunning you are. Because I REALLY don't care about how you live your life. That's your business, that's your problem - it's neither something I care about or want to know about.”
I would suggest that making us care is the problem. The FJB Administration is changing the rules for schools and civil rights laws to turn being transy a protected class, allowing biological males into school restrooms and into female sports. Younger kids are faced with seeing completely inappropriate, for their ages, sexual displays and drag shows in schools and library story hours. Schools are facilitating sex change in schools, and preventing parents from finding out. Etc. It’s a culture war, and the American Public is being told to shut up and take it. This bud light as campaign has given them a mechanism to show how they feel about it.
Vox tells us that everything will soon be back to normal. That’s what they want us to believe. And some on the left (their target audience) may naively believe them. No one else does, for good reason. I suspect that the ramifications are going to be worse than they were for Gillette (I know that I am not the only one here still boycotting them) because beer drinking is public, and grooming is private. No one else is going to know if you are back to using Gillette razors. Everyone in the bar, all of your friends, etc, will know the minute you backslide with again drinking Bud Light. It’s got that blue can. Coors Light is the Silver Bullet, etc. Visible to everyone.
Who should give a rip what Howard Stern says or asks?
Some folks take offense when others are made the targets of state-sanctioned ridicule. Fuck ‘em.
Explain to me why I should care about this. How does Bud Light hiring a moron spokesperson affect my life at all.
Because when - not if, when - they shit on something you do care about, I'll be the one over here smugly nodding 'I told you so. But you didn't care. So, eat it.'
I used to like regular Budweiser but when I'd order it the waitress would always say oh, Bud Light? Like there was no other kind.
No. Bud. Budweiser. Just that. But I don't touch the stuff now.
Less filling. Better taste. Less Bud. Better perception. Ribbit.
Sometimes you have to have conversations that are uncomfortable. Maybe you have to realize that you are white and a guy. Reach for a Bud Lite, the beer for wokey time. It hates you, too.
It’s probably meaningful that you rarely find an example of, say, a woke electrician or plumber or truck driver. This is not an ideology that infects people at random. It’s clearly a class phenomenon.
- Malcom Kyeyune - non-indigenous Swedish writer and blogger
Author of 'Wokeness, the Highest Stage of Managerialism
Well-educated progressives wield institutional power to impose a new political and social order.' at City Journal
So they struck a blow for against those who just aren't Woke and now seek to denigrate them for noticing. Howard Stern is a sad old man these days.
lonejustice--when your market cap is $132 Billion, it doesn't take a huge hit to drop $6 Billion.
"Care to share those "news sites" with us? Not saying it's not true, but a $6 billion loss seems a bit over the top for such a short period of time."
Going straight to the source to look at stock prices, shares outstanding and market cap: BUD has 1.98B shares outstanding. Share price was $66.57 at the start of the month. Yesterday it closed at 63.38. Today it closed at 64.31. Depending on your start and end date, it has lost between $4.5B and $6.3B in market cap, or somewhere between 3.4%-4.8%. By contrast, the S&P 500 has been basically flat during that period.
This whole thread is nuts. Everyone is talking about some trans influencing guy/girl drinking Bud Lite beer. Who the fuck cares? The economy is tanking and may result in a severe recession like the Great Depression. Say goodbye to your IRA and retirement investments. The war in Ukraine may well end up in WW III with nuclear weapons and the end of the world as we know it. Crime is rampant in our cities. You can't even walk around at night without the fear of being mugged or killed. Walmart and other stores have to close because of theft that is never prosecuted by Soros prosecutors. I could go on and on and on. But of course, so many people here think the #1 problem is some transvestite drinking Bud Lite beer. Fuck you. Get over it.
For at least 5 years, probably much longer, lesbians have been complaining that trans men, m>f are trying to "erase" them.
I think there is some truth to this though how much is certainly up for debate.
Listening to the No Agenda podcast www.noagendashow.com today John C Dvorak said something that got me thinking. He pointed out, correctly, that in the past some many? boys who were girlish would gravitate to being gay as they reached puberty and beyond. Now that boy is glommed onto by the transfolk and not only told that he is really a girl, he is given drugs to block puberty. Possibly surgery. All in the name of "confirming his true gender".
This is definitely happening and is a huge industry with lots of doctors, hospitals and companies making tons of money.
He was making a different point but got me to thinking.
By catching potential gay men early enough then physically altering them to the point that they are neither men nor women, the trans movement is erasing the gay community.
The modded boy can never be gay. Gay men will not be attracted to him. Either because they see him as a woman. Or be cause they see him as not a woman, but not a man either.
Even if they do become gay, they will not have the physical equipment to be any more than passively gay.
So they have taken a boy and made him into, essentially, an orc. In the process they have deprived the gay community of a potential member.
Not being a member of either community, it is no skin off my nose. I never saw the logic of grouping L/G with T. It does not seem like they have anything at all in common as groups.
Now I am wondering if they not only don't have common ground, but whether the T group is actively working to kill off "erase" the L/G groups.
I don't drink light beer, except at parties if they run out of club soda. If I want another scotch and soda and there's no more soda, light beer is a good substitute for soda. Actually, scotch brings out the taste of malt in some beers in which you would not ordinarily taste it.
Bud Light paid an influencer to endorse their product. That's it. Everything else is Right Wing Grifter fauxrage designed to milk more money out of the suckers. In a month, everyone will have moved on to the next grifter fauxrage.
Adam Curry of the No Agenda Show developed the original Budweiser and Bud Light websites in the 90s and was talking about working with Augustus Busch III and A-B on the podcast.
He also talked about how Dylan Mulvaney got this gig.
First, Mulvaney is not a brand ambassador, he is merely a social media influencer. Still a paid gig but much different than appearing in ads. The influencer pushes the product in their social media.
Second, Bud Light put up a contest for influencers to tell how they would influence people to drink Bud Light. It is apparently fairly common, the brand owner puts out a call "How could you get your followers to use more of our product?" The influencers respond with pitches and the brand owner selects 1 or more and says "Go forth and influence then send us an invoice"
So as soon as Mulvaney entered the contest, Budweiser was totally fucked. They could pick him, as they did, and expect more or less the results they are seeing.
Or, they could not pick him, in which case he would use his influencing power to make a big stink about how transphobic Budweiser is.
Either way they were screwed. The best they could do was launch on April 1, maintain radio silence about it and hope people saw it as an April Fool prank by Mulvaney.
Not sure if that could have worked, but in any event, it didn't. And now Budweiser the company has lost $4-6bn in value, Bud Light sales are in the toilet and may or may not ever be able to recover.
Poor Budweiser
John Henry
Way to go, Howard.
Just on the off chance that there is anyone in the world who has not heard of the Mulvaney/Bud controversy, talk it up on one of the most listened to shows in the world.
I suspect that a lot of Howard's listeners are, or were Bud Light drinkers. Now they may not be listeners anymore either.
And just Howard talking about it, regardless of which side he comes down or, or even playing it down the middle, just adds gasoline to the fire.
Keep quiet and maybe it will die down? Naaaah. He's HOWARD FRICKIN' STERN!!! Where would be the fun in keeping quiet?
John Henry
"But of course, so many people here think the #1 problem is some transvestite drinking Bud Lite beer."
Bud Light beer is the topic of the thread, so it would seem to be expected that people are talking about that in the comments section. I didn't notice anyone who thought this is the biggest problem we currently face, but perhaps I missed it? If so, it would be helpful if you would point out where that claim was made, and by whom. Thanks.
bonejustice said...
This whole thread is nuts. Everyone is talking about some trans influencing guy/girl drinking Bud Lite beer. Who the fuck cares?
--
And somehow you clicked to open the comments and read.
Hey, lonejustice: Why do you care what we comment about? No one said it was the #1 problem so you misrepresent the commenters. And who tf made the rule that said because other things happening might be more consequential that we should comment only on those things and not on the lesser issues.
It's called a slippery slope, LJ.
I haven't had a beer in going on 29 years this 4/28. I admit that some of my beer choices were based on peer pressure and advertising. But I was a drunk then.
MarcusB. THEOLDMAN
New Coke was a resounding success. Coca-Cola Classic sold more than the original original formula upon reintroduction.
Absolutely correct.
1) Coke's main concentrate plant for North America is located in Cidra Puerto Rico. (Trivial info: Pepsi until last year had their main NA concentrate plant in Cidra, about a mile away.I did a lot of work in both.) A very large proportion of all the concentrate is made there. It never stopped producing the original formula. It never had any plans to make New Coke and never did make a drop of it.
The concentrate is what is shipped to the Coke bottlers and is reconstituted for bottles and cans. The syrup, used in fountains like in McD, is like a very dilute concentrate. Cidra also makes a lot of that.
2) The New Coke controversy allowed coca-cola to rebrand regular Coke "Classic" which would have been hard to justify otherwise. Consumers would ask "What's classic about it? Just the same old Coke." I think you alluded to this.
3) New Coke was also successful as a product in its own right. Coke continued selling it, though in limited markets, from 1985 to 2002. In an industry, consumer packaged goods, where 60-80% of ALL new products failin 2-3 years, that is not a bad run.
I just smile every time anyone tells me that New Coke was a failure.
As Winston Churchill said, in another time and another context "Some chicken, some neck" I wish I could fail like that.
John Henry
lonejustice: "But of course, so many people here think the #1 problem is some transvestite drinking Bud Lite beer. Fuck you. Get over it."
How "surprising". Merely days after LLR-democratical Chuck signals his strong support for the radical trans agenda across the board, along comes lonejustice to once again, as always, in "true conservative" "muh principles" way, advocate for the complete surrender on this most critical social issue that has become the lead weapon of the maoist/marxist left in attacking our social fabric.
It appears LLR-democratical Chuck and lonejustice are attempting to run the old inside-outside squeeze play against conservatives to try and convince them in 5th column fashion to cease fighting back against the dems on all fronts.
Talk about obvious.
Sorry lonejustice. You and your pals aren't fooling anyone.
As PeeWee Herman used to say, when he screwed up again "I meant to do that."
Budweiser probably never wanted anything to do with Mulvaney and probably wishes they had never heard of him.
But now that this happened, as explained above, Budweiser is pretty much left with no choice but to deny that they screwed up. They have to say "We meant to do that." and just grit their teeth and quietly figure out how to save the company.
John Henry
"lonejustice' Chuck, is that you ?
But of course, so many people here think the #1 problem is some transvestite drinking Bud Lite beer. Fuck you. Get over it.
No, it's not the #1 problem. We have a government that is as close to certifiably insane as makes no difference. It plans to force us into electric cars (and trucks !) with no reliable source of electricity. It is spending trillions we don't have. It has poisoned the well from which our military is drawn. The military academies have become Social Justice academies. Public schools are not educating children. 75% of kids in Chicago can't read, let alone do arithmetic. But they all know what penises look like.
Boys drink beer. Real men drink Bourbon.
Or Rye
Or Scotch.
Who gives a shit about some gay actor trying to cash in?
I doubt if he drinks beer. More likely a Kit Royale.
"Why do you care so much?"
Howard Stern used to funny. He used to have interesting interviews. He's become what he used to hate and thinks he matured. You got old, dude.
I don't care, but I don't like to be lectured on morality by the products I spend money on. Your a beer like product. All you have to be is a beer like product. That's your only job. Save the virtue signaling for the innertubes.
"Why do you care so much?"
Howard Stern used to funny. He used to have interesting interviews. He's become what he used to hate and thinks he matured. You got old, dude.
I don't care, but I don't like to be lectured on morality by the products I spend money on. Your a beer like product. All you have to be is a beer like product. That's your only job. Save the virtue signaling for the innertubes.
have become Social Justice academies... But they all know what penises look like.
Penis envy is real. So are vagina's regrets. Democrats are Miffed, they hope that Plan-"B"ragg will be viable, and the homicide pill is undeniably a wicked solution to a hard problem: keep women affordable, available, and taxable, and the masculinists' "burden" of evidence aborted, cannibalized, sequestered in sanctuary States. h/t splooge stooges and the female and female-adjacent who lure them with empathetic appeal to their womb and tomb, respectively.
This boycott won't even last as long as the one against the NFL, when the black players started kneeling during the national anthem. The stadiums were packed a year later, and now the audience gets to listen to the black national anthem.
The American public's attention span is pretty short.
Bunkypotatohead: "This boycott won't even last as long as the one against the NFL,..."
I am betting you are incorrect.
There is no substitute for the NFL.
There is a universe of easy availability, cost equivalent, quality equivalent substitutes for Bud Light and other AB-Inbev products.
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