Transgender TikTok star Dylan Mulvaney (lead image) has finally gone on the public record following her collab with Bud Light three months ago that has since led to a boycott of the brand, a 30 per cent drop in sales and $US20 billion being wiped from the market cap of parent company Anheuser-Busch InBev.
Over night, the 26-year-old Mulvaney posted a video to her 1.8million Instagram followers to address the drama that’s fascinated media, marketing and even mainstream press – the world over – for the past three months and sent a shiver down the spine of every liberal-leaning CMO everywhere.
Mulvaney said of the blanket press coverage: “I was waiting for the brand to reach out to me, but they never did. I’ve been scared to leave my house.
“For a company to hire a trans person and then not publicly stand by them is worse than not hiring a trans person at all.
“Because it gives customers permission to be as transphobic and as hateful as they want. There’s should be nothing controversial or divisive about working with us.
“I have been ridiculed in public I’ve been followed and I have felt a loneliness that I wouldn’t wish on anyone,” she said.
Mulvaney added that Bud Light was a brand she “loved” and confessed she was a big beer drinker, too.
“One thing I will not tolerate people saying about me is that I don’t like beer because I love beer and I always have.”
Mulvaney said it was Bud Light’s marketing team that initially approached her to be involved with the collaboration. Although Bud has denied that, blaming it on a third-party agency that had since been fired.
Meanwhile, the CEO of Anheuser-Busch InBev, Brendan Whitworth, has used a TV interview to defend the Mulvaney controversy despite stopping short of calling it a mistake. While viewers attacked Whitworth for seemingly being evasive with his answers.
.@AnheuserBusch CEO Brendan Whitworth says his company has begun sending financial assistance wholesalers, who he says have been impacted by the recent controversy surrounding a Bud Light promotion with Dylan Mulvaney. pic.twitter.com/fpEzyBWuFW
— CBS Mornings (@CBSMornings) June 28, 2023
Appearing on CBS This Morning, Whitworth said Bud Light had become entangled in “divisive” conversations that it really should never have been part of.
“I think the conversation surrounding Bud Light has moved away from beer, and the conversation has become divisive,” Whitworth said. “And Bud Light really doesn’t belong there. Bud Light should be all about bringing people together.
“There’s a big social conversation taking place right now, and big brands are right in the middle of it and it’s not just our industry or Bud Light. It’s happening in retail, happening in fast food. And so for us what we need to understand – deeply understand and appreciate – is the consumer and what they want, what they care about, and what they expect from big brands.”
Whitworth was quick to add that Bud Light had been supporting gay and queer issues for almost 25 years.
He said: “And as we’ve said from the beginning, we’ll continue to support the communities and organisations we’ve supported for decades. But as we move forward, we want to focus on what we do best: which is brewing great beer for everyone.”
However, the CEO’s TV appearance didn’t sit well with social media users who suggested the company could do with a better PR/comms team.
One person tweeted: “Brendan Whitworth interview on CBS, interesting. Did Brendan not hear and understand the questions or was he just ignoring the questions?”
“Sounded like bogus word spaghetti to me. Too little, too late,” said another.
While another added: “Bud Light your CEO doing a dismal job on CBS Morning. Brendan Whitworth trying to both sides his decisions.”
In further Bud Light developments, two prominent Republican US senators, Ted Cruz and Marsha Blackburn, have opened a Senate investigation into whether or not Bud Light’s partnership with Mulvaney violated rules preventing advertising alcohol to minors.
In a letter to the Beer Institute’s Code Compliance Review Board, Cruz said the partnership marketed beer toward minors because many members of Mulvaney’s fan base are under the US drinking age of 21.
