America’s biggest selling beer brand, Bud Light, has joined Nike in upsetting its more conservative clientele after both brands used a transgender model in their latest campaigns.
In the case of Bud Light, it did a social media campaign with transgender activist and comic, Dylan Mulvaney.
Last week, Mulvaney posted a video across her social media channels announcing the new deal and promoting a contest that gave drinkers a chance to win $15,000.
The company also sent her a personalised can with her face and a message on the top reading “Cheers to 365 Days of Being a Woman”, to commemorate a year since she began her gender transition.
Mulvaney is currently on hormones to help her transition into a woman – and has been documenting her change “into girlhood”. She’d previously courted controversy for using her Instagram account to promote sanitary napkins.
The Instagram video currently has over 11,000 comments, and none of them particularly supportive.
In fact, according to news reports, sales of Bud Light in the Midwest, the South, and rural areas of the US have plummeted to virtually zero since the promotion began.
Country singer Travis Tritt lead a very public boycott of the beer, promptly banning it from his tour bus. Meanwhile, rocker Kid Rock posted a video of him shooting up packs of Bud with a semi-automatic machine gun!
(Warning: video contains unsavoury language.)
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Over at Nike, it’s managed to offend its feminist client base after also partnering with Mulvaney who posed for a series of pictures in the sportswear’s leggings and sports bra. Mulvaney was reportedly paid $US50,000 for the partnership.
Many protestors took to social media to express their fury that Mulvaney had been given the sponsorship and not a biological woman, with many confused about who the brand was trying to sell its products to with the ads.
One person raged on social media: “I really used to enjoy Nike as a brand but I will never wear another shoe from them after they feature Dylan Mulvaney as their new ambassador for women’s clothing.”
Another penned: “When will these brands understand that women do not want men dressing up as them to advertise their products?”
Olympic swimmer Sharron Davies claimed Mulvaney’s Nike-sponsored posts had set back attempts to protect women’s sport.
She said: “The ad feels like a parody of what women are – that Nike would do this feels like a kick in the teeth.
“The only way we can make these companies sit up and listen is to boycott with our wallet – it’s the only thing they listen to.”
A Nike spokesperson responded to the backlash by saying: “We welcome comments that contribute to a positive, constructive discussion. Hate speech will be deleted.”
However, Bud Light’s vice president, Alissa Heinerscheid, used a business podcast to defend the beer brand’s use of Mulvaney.
In the podcast from March 30, Heinerscheid claimed the Anheuser-Busch-owned brand had been “in decline for a really long time” – despite it being America’s number one selling beer with a market share of almost 14 per cent.
Heinerscheid said it was essential that the brand to attract more female and younger drinkers because otherwise “there will be no future for Bud Light”.
Interestingly, the brand hasn’t posted any more social posts since the furore erupted last week.
