Anheuser-Busch Budweiser PR and Alcohol Advertising Ethics

Introduction: Selling the Love of Beer

Do I love beer? My favorite brand is by far Anheuser-Busch's top-selling brand — Budweiser. Or do I love beer? I just saw two lizards on a cable channel tell me that Budweiser is what I crave. Anheuser-Busch must continuously expand sales so that the corporation meets both Wall Street's and its shareholders' expectations for continued corporate profits. They are not, in fact, merely expectations — they are demands for continued corporate profits. It is therefore crucial to Anheuser-Busch to convince consumers worldwide that not only do they love beer, but that they love Budweiser or one of the many Anheuser-Busch products.

It is troubling that advertising to minors is often part of those public relations marketing campaigns. As researchers have noted, "youth has its hazards. Cautioning adolescents about product dangers is a unique challenge for advertisers and policy makers. Given the current controversy surrounding the advertising and sale of tobacco and alcohol products to adolescents, it is important to understand how that audience attends to advertising for such products and associated cautionary statements" (Fox). Similar to the "Joe Camel" marketing tactics perpetrated by the tobacco industry, alcoholic beverage companies also do their best to attract the adolescent dollar. "The teenage market in the United States is extremely lucrative. Teens are fashion and status conscious, and spend large amounts of money on clothing and entertainment. In addition to influencing household purchases, teenagers spend at least $95 billion a year. The fact that many brand loyalties begin during adolescence and last through adulthood makes the group even more important to marketers" (Fox).

Budweiser is a quality product — at least that is what we are told. "At Anheuser-Busch, quality is more than a goal...it is a way of life. Quality doesn't just happen. An unwavering commitment to quality is at the heart of how Anheuser-Busch has done business since 1852. Then, as now, it is the key to our success and will continue to be in the future" (Anheuser-Busch Companies). With that claim in mind, it is worth examining the finer details of the alcoholic beverage industry's public relations marketing campaigns.

A Brief History of Anheuser-Busch and Budweiser

Like most companies with a product to sell, Anheuser-Busch has historically been an organization that advertised heavily. In the 1840s, two ambitious brewers toiled and eventually created the powerful and respected Anheuser-Busch brewery. "Eberhard Anheuser had bought out a Bavarian Brewery, and with that the stage was set for the entrance of the principal actor in the great drama of beer" (Holland). His son-in-law, "Adolphus Busch came to St. Louis equipped with a sound training at the Gymnasium in Mainz. He was the youngest of twenty-one children. His arrival was inconspicuous, but he soon made his presence felt" (Holland). From the beginning, competition in the brewing industry was fierce and, at times, cutthroat.

In the 1850s, large kegs were the only way to deliver beer to the numerous saloons, and Anheuser-Busch was compelled to offer marketing incentives — including outright bribes — to have their kegs accepted over competitors' brands. Entering new neighborhoods required large-scale advertising campaigns to win over local consumers, and marketing expenditures of various kinds were considered the cost of doing business.

Bottling provided both a solution to keg delivery challenges and an opportunity to expand revenues. Budweiser was not the first bottled beer in the world, but it was among the first bottled beers intended for wide-scale shipping. "Returning to America, he had the Busch brewery make the beer for him and called it Budweiser after the town of Budweis, where he had discovered it. He bottled the new drink in his own small shop" (Holland).

By 1855, Budweiser had become the best-bottled beer in the country. "While his rivals in St. Louis were struggling with wagon-load orders, he coolly turned his back on the local market, invested deeply, and set out as a traveling ambassador of beer. He scoured the nation, and eventually the world, everywhere preaching the gospel of Budweiser. His work was done magnificently. In a few years, the trade of the United States was predominantly in the hands of Anheuser-Busch" (Holland).

Budweiser became the brewery's flagship product, allowing the company to reduce its portfolio from sixteen brands to four — Michelob, Faust, Budweiser, and a standard pale beer. "Michelob was perhaps the best beer ever made in America and the most expensive; it sold for twenty-five cents a glass. Like Budweiser, it originated in Bohemia, but in this case it was Adolphus himself who found it" (Holland).

Works Cited

Anheuser-Busch Companies. http://www.anheuser-busch.com.

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De Marco, Donna. "Super Ads; Celebrities, Humor Highlight $2.2 Million Spots." The Washington Times [Washington] January 23, 2003.

Fox, Richard J., et al. "Adolescents' Attention to Beer and Cigarette Print Ads and Associated Product Warnings." Journal of Advertising Vol. 27 (1998).

Holland, Gerald. BeerHistory.com: The King of Beer. Parts 1–4.

Jacobson, Michael F., and Laurie Ann Mazur. Marketing Madness: A Survival Guide for a Consumer Society. Boulder, CO: Westview, 1995.

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Yahoo Finance. Yahoo. 4/28/03.