Bud Light has lost over $400 million in sales since teaming up with the transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney for a partnership back in April. Now, Mulvaney is speaking out to admit that she “feels guilty” over the backlash Bud Light has received since the brand celebrated her first full year of “girlhood” by putting her face on a can.
This isn’t a parody. Dylan Mulvaney is now the face of Bud Light. pic.twitter.com/cpygA74cG5
— Ian Miles Cheong (@stillgray) April 2, 2023
Mulvaney Speaks Out
“I think this has affected a lot more lives than obviously just mine. I always want to add value in any partnership that I do,” Mulvaney, 26, told The Cut.
“Part of me was concerned with my well-being, how to keep myself safe, how to keep myself out of a courtroom, how to keep myself successful,” the influencer continued. “And part of me was concerned with being a good person: How do I show up for the trans community right now in a way that I feel like I really can?”
Mulvaney went on to describe herself as a “sacrificial lamb in the election landscape,” adding that this whole debacle was a “wakeup call” and that she is “a more realistic person” now.
Mulvaney is trying to focus on the future, saying that she’d love to star in a Super Bowl ad.
“Maybe it’d be epic… if in like ten years I got to do a beer commercial for a Super Bowl,” she said.
Would you boycott the Super Bowl if they did a Dylan Mulvaney beer ad?
YES or NO pic.twitter.com/LABx4B5YPB
— Proud Elephant (@ProudElephantUS) September 13, 2023
Bud Light Debacle
This all started back in April, when Mulvaney revealed that Bud Light had sent her packs of Bud Light featuring the influencer’s face as a way to celebrate a full year of “girlhood.” Mulvaney went so far as to describe the beer cans as her “most prized possession” on Instagram with a post that featured the hashtag “#budlightpartner.”
This immediately backfired on Bud Light when conservatives launched a boycott of the beer brand that proved to be highly effective. Bud Light’s parent company Anheuser-Busch InBev reported that profits plummeted after the boycott, with U.S. revenue dropping 10.5% in the second quarter as earnings before taxes, interest and depreciation declined by 28.2%.
“Bud Light’s missteps felt like a betrayal to both its liberal and conservative customers, and that trust is going to take months, if not years, to rebuild,” Daniel Korschun, an associate professor of marketing at Drexel University’s LeBow College of Business, recently told The New York Times.
BUD LIGHT SALES JUST HIT ANOTHER LOW OF CLOSE TO 40% DOWN MORE THAN 6 MONTHS AFTER THEY HIRED WOKE TIK TOKER DYLAN MULVANEY AS THEIR SPOKESPERSON
THE COMPANY IS NOW ON TRACK TO GO OUT OF BUSINESS BY 2026
WHEN WE ALL WORK TOGETHER WE ARE EXTREMELY POWERFUL pic.twitter.com/EPHSusQDzd
— Matt Wallace (@MattWallace888) September 11, 2023
Related: Anheuser-Busch Loses $390 Million After Bud Light Boycott Over Dylan Mulvaney Campaign
Mulvaney And Consumers Ditch Bud Light
Afterwards, even Mulvaney turned her back on Bud Light.
“For a company to hire a trans person and then not publicly stand by them is worse, in my opinion, than not hiring a trans person at all,” Mulvaney said in a video posted to her social media back in June. “I sat waiting for a long time to figure out how to navigate something so intense.”
BREAKING: Brave transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney breaks her silence on the Bud Light controversy after weathering an endless barrage of Republican hatred.
She didn’t mince words, and slammed Anheuser-Busch for exploiting her to promote their product only to abandon her when… pic.twitter.com/dxEkU007u3
— Occupy Democrats (@OccupyDemocrats) June 29, 2023
Beer Business Daily publisher Harry Schuhmacher told Fox News last week that things are only looking more bleak for Bud Light moving forward.
“The Bud Light situation has actually gotten worse,” he said. “You see Bud Light still just stubbornly down around 30% in volume compared to last year, which is where it’s been since May or June. That tells me that this is quasi-permanent, meaning those consumers are just lost forever.”
It’s safe to say that both Mulvaney and Bud Light have learned the hard way that “go woke, go broke” is very real indeed. Mulvaney can say whatever she wants, but it can’t be denied that other brands should think twice before ever teaming up with her.
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