Anheuser-Busch will redesign its packaging with blatant pandering targeting Middle America and its love for the military, an apparent attempt to placate consumers angered by the company's partnership with deranged "transgender" influencer Dylan Mulvaney.
The beer company will temporarily alter designs on its aluminum Bud Light and Budweiser bottles to feature a camouflage pattern and a promo for Folds of Honor, a nonprofit program that helps the families of fallen or disabled veterans pay for education, the New York Post reported.
An anonymous source said, with intentional or unintentional irony, that it's the "only package that will be transitioning."
“It’s an aluminum bottle,” the source said. “I believe it is the only package that will be transitioning, but I am not 100% certain on that.”
The idea came out of an emergency meeting at the company's St. Louis headquarters last week, where executives discussed strategies for handling the consumer backlash.
So far, the company's approach has been to claw back the Mulvaney campaign while pandering to conservative and rural consumers.
Bud Light released a painfully on-the-nose advertisement two weeks ago that showed people enjoying Bud Light at a country music festival, with the song "Chicken Fried" by Zac Brown Band playing in the background.
The Post (which persists in calling Mulvaney a "her" for some reason) reports that Anheuser-Busch is weighing more advertisements incorporating the military, country music, farmers, cops, and first responders.
The beer company sent a letter to distributors downplaying the partnership with Mulvaney as "one single can," referring to a specially designed beer can featuring his face.
"This was one single can given to one social media influencer," the letter read. "It was not made for production or sale to the general public. This can is not a formal campaign or advertisement."
The backlash over Bud Light's foolish embrace of woke gender politics has proven surprisingly robust, after years of quiet grumbling on the right over corporate America's leftward drift.
Bud Light is still seeing declines in sales, with a drop of more than 20 percent the first week of May. Other Anheuser-Busch brands, like Budweiser and Michelob Ultra, have also suffered.
Can some slick-- or not so slick -- rebranding really make beer drinkers forget all about Bud Light's insult to consumers? The short-term answer seems to be, "no."
