If InBev is ever looking to sell Anheuser-Busch, the company can rest assured there’s a buyer waiting in line.
Billy Busch said he would be eager to purchase the company his family sold in 2008 back from InBev to “make that brand great again.”
The offer comes amid a boycott over Bud Light’s partnership with trans influencer Dylan Mulvaney, which began in April.
During an interview with conservative commentator Tomi Lahren, Busch said he didn’t think the Anheuser-Busch parent company understands its customer base.
“It’s a Brazilian-based company that really doesn’t live here in America,” he noted. “When you are a foreign company and you rely on these woke students that are coming out of these woke colleges to do your advertising for you, you’re making a big mistake.”
He added: “You need to go out there and understand who your core customer is.”
That’s something that was so important to his family, Busch said.
“They knew who their drinkers were. They were with the bar owners and the restaurant owners and the liquor store owners and talking to these people day in and day out,” he recalled. “Even my dad at 89 years old, 90 years old, he was still going to the bars selling Budweiser back in those days, in the ’80s.”
In a separate interview, Busch said his family “would be rolling over in their graves” over what’s unfolding with the company, which has lost nearly $400 million in revenue in North America for the quarter and seen its market value tank. Based on how attendees of the massive Sturgis Motorcycle Rally responded to a Budweiser tent, it doesn't look like things will get better anytime soon.
In that case, Busch told Lahren that if InBev doesn't "want that brand any longer, sell it back to the Busch family. Sell it to me. I’ll be the first in line to buy that brand back from you. And we’ll make that brand great again.”