Fact Check: Have Bud Light Sales Dropped 30% in Last Week?

Bud Light's partnership with a transgender influencer and activist—revealed earlier in the month—sparked outrage, prompting calls on social media for a boycott of the beer brand.

On April 2, Dylan Mulvaney posted a video to her 1.7 million Instagram followers in which she explained that Bud Light had sent her a personalized can with her face on it to commemorate 365 days of being a girl. The move drew criticism, with the brand being described as having "gone woke."

The row over transgender brand ambassadors is symbolic of a wider debate about the inclusion of transgender women in women's issues and spaces. LGBTQ+ activists say transgender women should be treated the same as other women, while many who have been critical of gender ideology say they are different and that hard-won women's rights must be protected.

A spokesperson for Anheuser-Busch, Bud Light's parent company, told Newsweek on April 3 that the company "works with hundreds of influencers across our brands as one of many ways to authentically connect with audiences across various demographics."

The company added that the commemorative can it had given to Mulvaney "was a gift to celebrate a personal milestone and is not for sale to the general public."

Calls for a boycott of the brand have since grown from social media posts to reports of acts of defiance against Bud Light. Supporters of Kari Lake, the Donald Trump-backed GOP candidate for Arizona Governor in 2022, refused to drink the beer brand at an open bar at a rally in Iowa. Meanwhile, a bar owner in Kentucky said he had noticed the beer sparking rows between patrons.

The Claim

On Wednesday, Oli London, a media personality who has become critical of the transgender movement since deciding to detransition, tweeted that Anheuser-Busch had lost around $3 billion in value since the controversy began at the start of the month, citing news outlets reporting the figure.

Those who have accused the brand of being "woke" over the partnership have taken credit for a recent drop in Anheuser-Busch's value.

Anheuser-Busch's market capitalization—the total value of a company's shares—had seen a steady rise since mid-March, marking a six-month upward trend in value, topping out at more than $134 billion on March 31, according to figures from the market research site Macrotrends.

However, since the furor over the partnership with Mulvaney, it saw a fall in that value of over $3 billion, with a market cap on April 10 of $130.8 billion. That figure has continued to decline since then, and as of 8 a.m. ET on Thursday, the company had a market cap of $110.6 billion—which would represent a fall of around $24 billion in 13 days.

That said, stocks in the company were trading in the high €60 to €61 ($65.50 to $66.70) range until they dropped on April 11, suggesting that if the value drop was linked to the uproar, it was a delayed reaction.

These fluctuations in value could be construed as the normalization of stock prices after a peak in late March. That rise could be attributed to the company posting revenue growth of 11.2 percent in 2022 on March 2—from $54.3 billion in 2021 to $57.8 billion last year.

London went on to write: "Bud Light sales have dropped 30 percent in the last week while draught beer sales are down 50 percent in many retailers and bars," referring to a story by Sports Keeda, a global sports content platform that also covers popular culture.

The Facts

An April 12 story by Sports Keeda cited a report by Fox Business while stating: "News outlets reported that sales of bottled Bud Light products have dropped more than 30 percent the past week, while draught beer sales plummeted 50 percent."

The article by Fox Business, published the previous day, had said that Bud Light had suffered a "bloodbath," with a Missouri bar owner telling the news outlet that he had witnessed the effects of the brand alienating its traditional audience.

The Fox story made clear that the figures it quoted were specific to Case & Bucks, a restaurant and sports bar in Barnhart, Missouri, whose owner, Jeff Fitter, it had interviewed.

Anheuser-Busch released its fourth-quarter and full-year financial results for 2022 in March, and its second-quarter results are not expected to be released until July. Newsweek approached the company via email for comment on Thursday.

The Ruling

Unverified. The only figures that confirm the claim are based on the anecdotal statements of a single bar owner in Missouri. The true, national impact on Bud Light sales from the controversy over its partnership with Mulvaney may not become clear for several months.

FACT CHECK BY NEWSWEEK