The psychology of the on-going boycott and sales declines of Bud Light beer is due to two main things, says former Anheuser-Busch executive Anson Frericks on "Varney & Co" on Fox Business News on Friday.."There's two reasons boycotts tend to be successful. The first is when it's easy for consumers to switch to other brands. And it's secondarily when people feel like they're having an impact," Frericks said.."And in this, Bud Light, it's not very that much different than Coors Light or Miller Lite. It's water, it's barley, it's hops. What sets it apart is its messaging. And so it's easy for consumers to switch the grocery store, the convenience store, and … consumers feel like they're having an impact.".Another problem is Bud Light was presented as being something it wasn’t, said Frericks.."What does Bud Light stand for? Bud Light was a brand that was never about politics," he said.."This is always about a brand that brought people together. It was about football. It was about sports. It was about music. It never got involved in political situations. That's why it was enjoyed by both Republicans and Democrats equally, and that was what made the brand actually remarkable, is that it was remarkably unpolitical and this is just a political situation they should not have got themselves in."."With Bud Light, that was never part of the brand or part of the message. And I think that's what has upset so many people here. And that's why I think this boycott is going to go on a lot longer than people give it credit for.".Bud Light’s sales declined precipitously in May, dropping 23.6% in the first week of the month when compared to last year, eclipsing the 23.3% decline the brand saw in the last week of April, according to data from Bump Williams Consulting and NielsenIQ, cited by the New York Post..Anheuser-Busch has been scrambling since the first week of April, when the relationship between Bud Light and transgender influencer, Dylan Mulvaney, was unveiled..Bud Light’s marketing vice-president Alissa Heinerscheid, the architect of the disaster, who was caught in an interview calling the brand "fratty" took a leave of absence, as did Daniel Blake, who oversees marketing for Anheuser-Busch’s mainstream brands..The company then tried to distance itself from the Mulvaney campaign saying a "third-party ad agency" was responsible for the collaboration with no intention to sell cans with Mulvaney’s mug on them. While declining to name the agency, Anheuser-Busch said it had been fired..The latest move was launching a line of camouflage aluminum bottles, promoting the ‘Folds of Honor’ program, which provides educational scholarships for families of fallen and disabled American military service members and first responders, the New York Post reported..There is a general consensus the attempts to undo the damage from the Mulvaney marketing campaign will not undo the damage done to the brand. .Frericks told Fox he doesn't see the company's efforts to rekindle a following working. ."One thing that they haven't done is say they made a mistake with this campaign and been clear about who they're going to serve moving forward," he said.."Is it going to be their shareholders and their customers who want them just to create a Bud Light that's apolitical, or are they going to be serving their stakeholders?”."I think until they're clear, and they make it clear, that they want to serve their customers moving forward, unfortunately, I don't see this going away," said Frericks.
