{"id":2024953,"date":"2023-09-07T17:27:04","date_gmt":"2023-09-07T21:27:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/ex-bud-light-executive-responds-to-bill-gates-purchase-of-bud-light-parent-company\/"},"modified":"2023-09-07T17:29:29","modified_gmt":"2023-09-07T21:29:29","slug":"ex-bud-light-executive-responds-to-bill-gates-purchase-of-bud-light-parent-company","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/ex-bud-light-executive-responds-to-bill-gates-purchase-of-bud-light-parent-company\/","title":{"rendered":"Former Bud Light executive comments on Bill Gates&#8217; acquisition of Bud Light&#8217;s parent company."},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">28<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fex-bud-light-executive-responds-to-bill-gates-purchase-of-bud-light-parent-company%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=2024953&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><h2>A Former Executive Criticizes Bill Gates&#8217; Investment in \u200bBud Light<\/h2>\n<p>A \u200dformer executive with Bud Light responded to billionaire Bill \u200bGates&#8217; foundation purchasing nearly $100 million shares in its <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/bill-gates-backs-bud-light-with-95-million-bet\/\" title=\"Bill Gates invests  million in Bud Light.\">parent company amid<\/a>\u2062 a\u200b months-long boycott.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>&#8220;Bill Gates is definitely making a mistake,&#8221; former \u200dAnheuser-Busch \u2064executive Anson Frericks \u200ctold \u200b <a href=\"https:\/\/www.foxbusiness.com\/business-leaders\/bill-gates-big-bet-bud-light-mistake-former-<a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/super-bowl-lv-all-the-best-commercials\/\" title=\"Super Bowl LV: All The Best Commercials\">anheuser-busch<\/a>-exec&#8221; target=&#8221;_blank&#8221; rel=&#8221;noopener&#8221;>Fox Business<\/a> this week. &#8220;Earlier this year, he already made a $900 million \u2064mistake when he invested into one of Anheuser-Busch&#8217;s largest rivals, Heineken. He did that \u200dearlier this year. And since that investment, Heineken&#8217;s down\u2064 about 10 percent, whereas\u200c the\u200c broader markets are up 10 percent.&#8221;<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>The Bill \u2062and Melinda Gates Foundation Trust, which Mr. Gates helped co-found, purchased about 1.7 million shares\u200d of Anheuser-Busch InBev, which \u2064owns Bud Light, for about $95 \u2062million \u200din the\u200b last quarter, according \u200dto a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theepochtimes.com\/us\/bill-gates-backs-bud-light-with-95-million-bet-5487135\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">recent<\/a> regulatory\u200b filing. \u200bHe has not issued a public\u2062 comment \u200cabout the purchase.<\/p>\n<h3>Questionable Investment Choices<\/h3>\n<p>&#8220;So \u200bif I was looking for \u2063advice on investing to software companies, tech companies, I \u200dmight go to Bill Gates. But if\u2063 you&#8217;re looking at the beer industry, he doesn&#8217;t have a great \u2064track record \u2063of investing in winners at this\u2063 point,&#8221; Mr. Frericks, who has been critical of Bud Light, said\u200b on Wednesday.<\/p>\n<p>Anheuser-Busch&#8217;s American division\u200b reported about a 10 percent decline in profits in the second quarter due to \u200ca boycott that was initiated in April after Bud Light made a promotional package for a transgender activist. Conservatives, after learning of the news, were \u200cswift to call for action against Bud Light, which also lost its top spot to\u200c Modelo Especial earlier this \u200cyear.<\/p>\n<p>Sales of Bud Light have dropped year-over-year in many <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/newsom-holds-indoor-event-at-restaurant-barred-from-offering-indoor-dining\/\" title=\"Newsom Holds Indoor Event at Restaurant Barred From Offering Indoor Dining\">consecutive weeks<\/a>. As of\u200c Aug. 19, sales volumes of Bud Light at off-premise locations like grocery stores fell by 20.1 percent so far this\u2063 year, as compared to the \u2063same \u200cperiod last year, according to \u2062Nielsen IQ \u2063sales data via Bump Williams Consulting.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;For the company&#8217;s sake, they&#8217;d probably be better off [with] maybe somebody who is\u2063 more of,\u200d kind of the everyman type of person, maybe like a Rob Gronkowski or somebody like that \u2063was investing into Anheuser-Busch, not necessarily somebody like Bill Gates. That doesn&#8217;t really resonate with sort of that common man that everyday \u200bBud Light beer drinker,&#8221; Mr. Frericks said.<\/p>\n<p>One\u200d <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/ex-bud-light-executive-responds-to-bill-gates-purchase-of-bud-light-parent-company\/\" title=\"Former Bud Light executive comments on Bill Gates' acquisition of Bud Light's parent company.\">analyst recently wrote<\/a> \u200cthat it&#8217;s not clear \u2064whether Anheuser-Busch InBev or its\u2063 distributors will have to make &#8220;structural changes.&#8221; Anheuser-Busch confirmed weeks ago that it laid off about 300\u200b of its corporate employees in the midst\u200c of \u200bthe backlash.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cContinued weakness begs the question of\u200c whether Anheuser-Busch InBev and\/or its distributors will have to make significant structural changes to reduce their cost basis if \u200dtrends don\u2019t improve over the next few months,\u201d Evercore ISI analyst Robert Ottenstein wrote in a recent note, \u200dYahoo Finance recently reported.<\/p>\n<p>Sales \u200dwere also stale the\u2062 week prior. As of Aug. 13, Bud Light\u2019s sales dropped 28.1 percent year-over-year, as well \u2063as volume \u2064declines of 28 \u2063percent, \u200caccording to data\u2064 from Evercore ISI and Circana.<\/p>\n<p>The boycott \u200dstarted when Bud Light sent a personalized beer can with transgender influencer\u200c Dylan Mulvaney&#8217;s face on it, which was then posted\u2063 on social media. Conservatives were \u2062quick to react, with musician Kid Rock using Bud Light cans as target practice, while several\u2062 country \u2063singers said they wouldn&#8217;t \u200dserve the brand.<\/p>\n<p>Former President Donald Trump \u200balso\u200c responded to the controversy, saying that brands should cater to left-wing trends or demands.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s time to beat the Radical Left\u2064 at their own game,\u201d the former president\u2062 said\u2063 in a post on Truth Social in May. \u201cMoney does talk\u2014Anheuser-Busch now understands that.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>His chief \u2063GOP rival, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, also said he is opening\u2063 an\u200d investigation into Bud Light and whether it \u2063failed\u00a0\u201cto remediate the problem and repair its\u2062 relationship with millions of \u200bdisaffected American consumers.&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A former Bud Light executive, Anson Frericks, criticized billionaire Bill Gates for his foundation&#8217;s purchase of nearly $100 million shares in the parent company, amidst an ongoing boycott. Frericks stated that Gates is repeating his previous $900 million mistake from earlier this year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":58,"featured_media":2024954,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cndimages.nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/IMG_2758-scaled-1.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[543],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2024953","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-the-epoch-times"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cndimages.nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/IMG_2758-scaled-1.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2024953","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/58"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2024953"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2024953\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2024954"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2024953"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2024953"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2024953"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}