The 4 Cs of the Bud Light Fiasco ─ CMOs, Creativity, Channel and Competition
Bill Field
An insightful business strategist who “activates" agencies, brands & people in the business-to-channel space.
Four months after the Dylan Mulvaney/Bud Light ad fiasco, there is greater clarity that goes beyond the initial outrage and uproar from every conceivable direction – from cratering Bud Light sales volume to Kid Rock blasting 30-packs.?As the dust settles and media noise subsides, there are many losers and few winners in what is sure to be a studied and quoted marketing case history for decades to come.?
CMO Careers
Lost in the Bud Light maelstrom is that real people were impacted here.?Alissa Heinerscheid (Bud Light’s VP Marketing) and Daniel Blake (Anheuser-Busch’s Group VP Marketing) are both on a leave of absence and relegated to damaged goods status for future marketing employment.?Not to mention the hundreds of individuals caught up in a layoff purge manifested by the sustained 25% Bud Light sales decline.?
Heinerscheid was brought in to create “A new era for Bud Light” by moving away from the frat boy image to connect with the newer generation of drinkers.?Let’s admit, Bud Light loyalists aren’t getting any younger.?The goal was to evolve and elevate an iconic brand.?The overall strategic direction there can’t be faulted, but the execution missed the mark and failed miserably.?
Like many CMO’s, she felt she had a mandate.?How many CMO’s have fallen prey to this misperception??Culture is a hard thing to change and read.?More often it is brand evolution rather than revolution. ?There is no question that the Chief Marketing Officer role is going to face intense scrutiny going forward, by both potential employees and employers.?The CMO seat at the C-Suite table is going to be hot and tenuous.
Creativity
One of the biggest losers coming out of the Bud Light marketing storm is creativity itself.?In the near term, anything creatively edgy or breakthrough is sure to get squashed by every level of management across the boardrooms of consumer brands. ?Like it or not, safe and expected creative executions are the new normal.?Risk taking is going to be relegated to the back seat.?
Predictably, Bud Light’s initial campaign after the marketing fiasco featured Zac Brown band’s Chicken Fried as the soundtrack backdrop to enjoying Bud Light beer in a sudden rain squall.?Nothing better than jeans that fit just right on a Friday night.?The old beer ad playbook.?Why not trot out the Clydesdales while you’re at it??That’s right, A-B brought them out of their stalls.?You’re sure to see them turn up again at holiday time faithfully delivering A-B product with the dalmatian at rapt attention on the front buckboard.?Been there and done that.?
Creatives are going to have one arm tied behind their backs in the foreseeable future.?Great creative takes guts and fortitude to approve and run.?Let’s hope that creativity lives through this.?Vanilla creative is just that – plain.
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Channel
The fallout of the drop in Bud Light sales runs deep through the Anheuser-Busch sales channels.?At one time, having the distribution rights to A-B was pure gold, back when Budweiser was the “King of Beers.” The past four months have been devastating to distributor salespeople as they lost commissions, or worse yet, were laid off.?Retail outlets are giving A-B distributor salespeople the cold shoulder.?Talk about a cold call.???
A-B is taking to providing financial assistance to distributors to offset the precipitous drop in sales.?According to Beer Business Daily, many distributors are getting 20 to 50 cents back per case depending upon the sales slippage.?They’re also reimbursing fuel and freight surcharges.?Making distributors “whole” is costing them big bucks.?The brand becomes subservient to the sales channel.?That’s a slippery slope to navigate. There’s no question that A-B distributors are going to want a stronger voice in future marketing campaigns.?
Competition
In business and branding there are always winners and losers.?Bud Light lost its crown as America's bestselling beer to Modelo, a Mexican lager brewed by?Grupo Modelo. ?Losing the top spot is softened somewhat for them as Grupo Modelo is owned by Anheuser-Busch.?That’s the power of a huge brand portfolio.?
This sales shift has been on the horizon for several years.?Modelo’s new “Mark of a Fighter” ad campaign is tough and gritty in style and tone that connects with audiences of all ethnic backgrounds and ages.?It skews young, but doesn’t ignore or alienate us older dudes. ?The tagline “for those with a fighting spirit” has resonated for years.?In many ways, Modelo is aligned with the same audiences that Bud Light was seeking.?They achieved brand preference with well executed commercials that were consistently on message without marketing gimmickry.?Plus, Modelo is a damn good beer.?Great product with great advertising.?That’s a time proven marketing strategy that lives on.?
How this saga continues to unfold is anyone’s guess.?One thing is certain, it’s a fascinating brand story to follow, maybe even with a tall-boy lager or pilsner by your side.
Have Sledgehammer. Will Travel.
1 年Well said Bill. Successful campaigns focus on the long term (as you cited in Modelo’s success story), but CMO’s and their teams are often on short leashes and under pressure for quick, if not immediate results. Also in the case of Bud Light, it appears the Voice of the Customer (from casual supporters to diehards) was ignored or dismissed.
Marketing Manager at Victory Energy Operations, LLC
1 年Excellent essay, Bill!
Creative Director, Digital at Adams & Knight
1 年Is a bad business decision always a bad decision?
Owner, Stonepier
1 年If one thumbs their nose at a broad swath of the American public, chasing a much smaller niche, its inevitable that they will lose the larger group. Blue-collar "pride" exists as much as the other "pride". In this case a big part of the country feels rightly or wrongly that they are getting ignored, and boycotting Bud Light is a way that they can send their message. This fiasco is not different from when Hilary Clinton labeled all Trump supporters as "deplorables". Let's be real, agencies and marketers for the most part sit in an Ivory Tower of liberal education, wealth and privilege which can make them very shortsighted. Clearly that is what happened here.
Paul is an award-winning brand strategist that creates game-changing brands. He’s an outcome-driven marketing strategist, brand activator and a entrepreneur who is experienced in creating business success.
1 年Excellent article, Bill. Another lesson from the Bud Lite fiasco that corporations must be clear about is crossing the line with Woke political agendas and how they may not align with the masses. I’ll have an IPA ?? please.