Bud Light posted a “countrified’ YouTube ad that showed young beer drinkers frolicking in the rain at a country music festival — but has disabled user comments amid continued backlash over its sponsorship deal with Dylan Mulvaney.
The 30-second ad — which kicks off a major advertising blitz by the bear giant in the wake of its ill-fated tie-up with the 26-year-old transgender influencer — first aired during prime time coverage of the NFL Draft last week on Disney-owned ABC and ESPN.
The spot shows four people — a man and three women apparently in their early-to-mid 20s — popping open a can of Bud Light as they rush to get out of the rain.
While the actors scurry for cover though what looks like a mountainous outdoor venue in the Western US, a song by the Zac Brown Band is heard playing in the background.
“Rain or shine, it’s always easy to enjoy a Bud Light,” the company said in the caption of the YouTube clip.
As of Monday, the clip generated more than 26 million views, but just 272 likes. Notably, the comments section under the YouTube clip was turned off.
Meanwhile, Bud Light continued to face heat on Twitter for the deal with Mulvaney, a transgender influencer with 10 million followers on social media.
“A commercial that shows cowboys & cowgirls at a rodeo where it’s started to pour down rain while the Zac Brown Band plays ‘Chicken Fried’ is Bud Light’s latest commercial. Real smart, piss off that demographic, then cynically try to lure them back with this. Don’t fall for it,” one Twitter user wrote.
“No amount of crappy marketing is going to save Bud Light,” another Twitter commenter wrote.
“That bridge is burned.”
Another Twitter user wondered: “Does this heartfelt ad with an iconic song make you feel nostalgic about Trans Lite, or do you think this is bunch of horse poop?”
The Post has sought comment from Bud Light’s parent company Anheuser-Busch.
The reaction was similar to the one that followed Budweiser’s Clydesdales ad that was released in an effort to quell the uproar over Bud Light’s partnership with Mulvaney, the transgender social media influencer who amassed a following of more than 10 million people online who tracked her transition from a man to a woman during the COVID pandemic.
The backlash appears to have had an impact on Bud Light’s sales, which dropped 17% in the week ending April 15 compared to the same period last year.
The controversy also prompted Bud Light to place two marketing executives — Alissa Heinerscheid, the vice president of marketing, and her boss, Daniel Blake — on leave.
A day before the Mulvaney partnership, Heinerscheid revealed her plans to move Bud Light’s image away from “fratty” and “out of touch” humor.
Mulvaney’s brand deals with Nike, Maybelline, and Kate Spade have also triggered backlash.
Women’s magazine Allure recently put Mulvaney on its annual “A-list,” prompting calls for a boycott of the publication’s parent company Condé Nast.
Mulvaney hit back at critics, saying she doesn’t want brands to hire her just to “check a box.”
“A lot of brands will ask, ‘Could you relate a little bit of your struggle growing up into this?’ Like, no! If you want me, you want me because I’m Dylan, not because I’m trans,” she told the outlet Bustle in an interview published Thursday.
“That’s when you know they were just trying to check a box,” Mulvaney said.
On Thursday, the influencer returned to Instagram following the backlash over her partnership with the beer brand.
“A lot has been said about me,” she said in a clip shared with her 1.8 million followers on the platform. “Some of which is so far from my truth that I was hearing my name and I didn’t know who they were talking about sometimes.
“It was so loud that I didn’t even feel part of the conversation so I decided to take the backseat,” she added.
[Written in collaboration with other media outlets with information from the following sources]
