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Posted on 09/15/2026 2:33:35 AM PDT by Cronos
Three years after Bud Light lost its position as America’s top-selling beer, AB InBev is directing more marketing support toward other labels in its portfolio. The shift comes as Bud Light volumes keep falling in a shrinking U.S. beer market, while Michelob Ultra gains share with spending tied to health and lifestyle trends.
As reported by Financial Times, AB InBev is reducing media support for Bud Light after celebrity campaigns and sports sponsorships fail to reverse the brand’s decline. Kantar analysis of MediaRadar data shows Bud Light advertising spending rose to $125.2 million between 2022 and 2023, then falls each year afterward, reaching about $44 million this year through July, down 14 per cent.
Over the same period, AB InBev increases spending on Michelob Ultra, with media outlays up 38 per cent to $114 million. The brand, promoted around an active lifestyle and backed as North American beer sponsor of the Fifa World Cup, has replaced Bud Light as the most popular beer by volume in the U.S.
Bud Light remains present in television advertising through campaigns featuring Peyton Manning, Post Malone and comedian Shane Gillis, and it continues high-profile sports ties through the National Football League and the UFC. Yet the brand is absent from key growth highlights in AB InBev’s latest investor materials and goes unmentioned on the company’s earnings call last week.
Analyst Robert Ottenstein of Evercore ISI estimates AB InBev will sell 12.7 million barrels of Bud Light in the U.S. this year, down from 15.8 million in 2024. At its peak in 2007 and 2008, Bud Light sold 41 million barrels and accounted for about a fifth of U.S. beer sales, according to Beer Marketer’s Insights. Portfolio strategy reflects wider U.S. drinking trends AB InBev says its total North American beer volumes decline 1.9 per cent year over year in the first half of 2026, while it highlights share gains for Michelob Ultra, Busch Light and Busch Light Apple. Bud Light appears in the company’s presentation only in a ranking of valuable global beer brands and in references to sponsorship agreements.
The company’s broader strategy has been shifting since 2021, when it concentrates most marketing and sales spending on 50 megabrands from a portfolio of 500 worldwide. It also expands offerings in lower-calorie, lower-alcohol, gluten-free and sugar-free beer, and pushes further into ready-to-drink canned cocktails such as Cutwater.
The repositioning comes as U.S. beer consumption weakens for structural reasons beyond Bud Light’s brand controversy. Consumers are cutting back because of health concerns, the use of weight-loss drugs and a move toward cocktails or legal cannabis, while low switching costs in light beer make it easier for drinkers to move to rivals such as Coors Light, Miller Lite and Modelo, or to other AB InBev brands.
In our earlier article on Citadel’s deal with Situational Awareness, we explained how a sharp reversal in AI-linked stocks triggered heavy July losses at the hedge fund and forced it to unwind a large public-equities portfolio. We also noted how Citadel stepped in as a stabilizing buyer, helping ease fears of broader market spillover as the fund sold assets and scaled back leverage.
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Media spending on Bud Light dropped 14% to $44 million through July 2026. Meanwhile, AB InBev shifted its capital to Michelob Ultra, boosting its budget by 38% to $114 million to capture health-conscious beer drinkers.
Thsi means that Bud light will drop further in sales.
Easiest money given up.
I still see yuge stacks of the stuff that have been pushed out to the retail outlets.
I live in a tiny town in Florida. My impression is that the craziness exemplified by the Bud Lite/Dylan Mulvaney fiasco has run its course. (I had to look up the name Dylan Mulvaney.) Today I’m seeing fewer weird hair people. There’s nothing visible from the alphabet people. Government at all levels has apparently toned down the DEI hires. I see fewer obvious body modifications, like the stretched earlobes. But my town was always a pale reflection of the trends flowing out of the blue states. What’s “hip” seems to be trending towards what was hip twenty years ago. Young men are in the gym getting jacked. People in general just seem to be getting on with their lives and not trying to project whatever the crazy trend someplace else is.
I’m interested in your observations in your area and invite your view.
Incidentally, “Dylan Mulvaney is now based in the UK, performing on the West End stage, and continuing (her) multifaceted career in acting, music, and social media advocacy.” The point is, he has fled the United States, which is fine by me. But I suspect this plays into the larger collapse of the alphabet people trend.
I guess even using Payton Manning to pimp for Bud Light isn’t working.
When the last “real man of genius” leaves the room, please turn off the lights.
The last “real man of genius” is the one who pushed the tranny ad campaign.
I looked...I don’t know...the (new) N. American division CEO looks pretty solid (Marine Corps and CIA vet):
https://www.ab-inbev.com/our-leaders-brendan-whitworth
The Belgian HQ people not so much.
Guess who’s calling the shots?
I was in the hospital fo510 days last March.
When I got home I realized I hadn’t had a beer in almost 2 weeks and I never even thought about it.
12 or so days is a 49 year record by like 10 days!
So I decided to just stop...6 month anniversary a few days ago.
Probably never go back...got a couple of more grand in the debit account because of it. :)
Good on you!
and yet it was the American div Marine vet CEO who let the marketing lady in the USA do her thang
It seems that young people want to be healthier than the Boomer generation. Alcohol kills indeed but perhaps more and more young people have turned to weed as a pastime and need a more mellowing agent?
The Boomers used weed AND alcohol but weed was illegal then so maybe this is the reason for the trend?
More stoned people hanging around than drunk individuals?
Real men won’t drink gay beer. That label will stick around for at least a generation. I don’t even drink beer and I still think of bud light as gay and if I did drink I wouldn’t drink that with so many other options like Coors light and Miller Lite
when I order a beer at a bar, and they ask me which one, I always respond, “Anything but a Bud Light”.
It started as a tone deaf marketing ploy that alienated lots of its customer base. Then the boycott caused that base to try other beers, thus realizing that Bud Light tastes like a$$.
CC
Good for you - I stopped 38hyears ago - and if I hadn’t, I might not be here - or be too broke to enjoy “retirement” - I’d probably be a 73 year old Walmart greeter, instead of comfortable..
My respect for Peyton & Shane Gillis dropped when they became Dylan Mulvaney “associates”.
Bet I wasn’t the only one.
“I guess even using Payton Manning to pimp for Bud Light isn’t working.”
Either Payton finally found a team he couldn’t turn around or it was his excellent sense of humor. If he’d brought his brother Eli in, it could only be their idea of a joke. Knowing him the money was donated to a children’s hospital.
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