Bud Light sales plunged the week preceding the key Fourth of July holiday, spelling more signs of doom for the household name following the Dylan Mulvaney marketing debacle.
Sales for the brand dropped 27.9 percent compared to a year ago in the week ended June 24, according to data from NielsenIQ and Bump Williams Consulting. That slip was a slight improvement from the record 28.5 percent decrease in sales that Bud Light suffered the week before due to an unwise creative collaboration with transgender influencer Mulvaney.
Independence Day and the weekend around it is historically a pivotal sales period for beer as Americans celebrate with patriotic provisions.
“The Fourth of July is the biggest beer holiday in terms of retail sales and an opportunity to move a lot of volume,” Dave Williams, vice president of Bump Williams, told the New York Post. “And there has been no notable signs where the course has changed for Bud Light.”
Anheuser-Busch’s other brands have also taken a hit since the Mulvaney scandal but with less severity than the flagship beer.
Sales of Michelob Ultra dipped 4.4 percent compared to a 4 percent drop the week before. Budweiser fell 12.1 percent compared to 12.3 percent the previous week, Bump Williams data show.
Mulvaney last week accused Bud Light of giving “customers permission to be as transphobic and as hateful as they want” amid the fallout over the minor partnership.
“For a company to hire a trans person and then not publicly stand by them is worse than not hiring a trans person at all,” Mulvaney said in a video posted to social media.
After the incident, Anheuser-Busch CEO Brendan Whitworth released a statement suggesting the company was surprised by the fallout. The statement did not take a strong stand for either side of the issue. LGBT advocates claimed it failed to defend Mulvaney, and conservatives said it hardly counted as an apology.
In the latest video update, Mulvaney claimed to have faced “more bullying and transphobia than I could have ever imagined” since the partnership went live.
“I’ve been scared to leave my house,” Mulvaney said.
“Supporting trans people shouldn’t be political,” the influencer added. “There should be nothing divisive or controversial about working with us.”
In the viral post that sparked a backlash among Bud Light’s traditional consumer base, Mulvaney posed in a bathtub surrounded by the iconic blue cans. The outcry has continued for months, leading to Modelo’s dethroning of Bud Light from its spot as America’s most popular beer as its sales have climbed. HSBC also downgraded Anheuser-Busch stock.