Models Are Continuing to Promote Bud Light in This Conservative State

As the ongoing Bud Light boycott is nearing the three-month mark, a host of models are continuing to promote the beer—and other products under the Anheuser-Busch InBev umbrella—in a state long known to be conservative.

Bud Light was initially targeted in April for a small branded partnership it had with transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney. In a video posted April 1 to Instagram, Mulvaney said the beer brand had sent her a can with her face on it to commemorate her 365 days living as a woman.

Mulvaney's partnership with Bud Light drew condemnation from several conservative figures, such as U.S. Representative Dan Crenshaw of Texas. Many issued calls for a boycott of the beer brand, and an increasing number of companies have been scrutinized for their pro-LGBTQ+ marketing initiatives.

Sales of Bud Light have tumbled since the controversy began, with Modelo Especial dethroning the brand as the bestselling beer in the United States.

With Anheuser-Busch still under scrutiny, a recent casting email seeking promotional models for Bud Light in Utah was recently characterized by a conservative influencer as "an act of desperation" following weeks of boycotts. The job, which was posted for June 3, sought 21- to 30-year-old females willing to be "representing Bud Light and visiting multiple bars that day/night distributing swag."

While the post was derided on social media, representatives of Urban Talent Management—the agency serving Utah, Idaho and Nevada that sent out the casting email—told Newsweek the company has worked with Anheuser-Busch on such events for more than two decades.

"Anheuser-Busch, along with really any of the other liquor brands, hire promotional models for crowd-gathering events, country fan fests, things like that," said Kendall Tate, the agency's senior booking agent.

"The Budweiser group and the Bud Light group have been on a bar-hopping tour giving out T-shirts and sunglasses and all sorts of swag, visiting local bars in Salt Lake City and in the state of Utah itself," he continued. "So they reached out to us and said, 'Hey, we've got promotions coming up.' We hire talent for their promotions in particular."

Conservative Values

While anti-LGBTQ+ sentiment has swept parts of the country and affected how conservative-leaning voters have viewed Anheuser-Busch, Tate said that, at least on a local level, a greater concern is the alcoholic product itself rather than any politics.

Addressing the agency's casting email that was shared last week on Twitter, he explained that it "was just our message to our talent to see who's available, who's comfortable representing an alcohol brand. We're in a conservative state, in Utah. So not all of our talent are comfortable representing an alcohol brand, regardless of brand, because of their conservative values."

Tate continued: "So when it comes to working with alcohol companies, we always check and say, 'Hey, this is an alcohol brand, you do need to be 21. And you do need to be comfortable representing alcohol,' because of the conservative values that are in the state of Utah."

He went on: "I mean, it could be any alcohol brand. It could be Tito's, it could be Coors Light, it could be whomever. We're a conservative state, so we definitely have to make sure people are comfortable with choosing in or out, regardless of what the company is dealing with."

Tate acknowledges that Anheuser-Busch is "very much under the microscope" on a national level and that there's "definitely been a sales dip" since the Mulvaney partnership. But it's been business as usual on the events front in Utah, which is known for having the strictest alcohol laws in the country.

"Here locally, with this local distribution group and their events, we probably had six or seven different events that have occurred since April," he said. "We're in mid-June right now. Some of those events we knew of before April. Some of those events have been on their calendar since after April, but they planned to just hire talent.

"So from the hiring of talent and having events and promotions, it has been business as usual. It hasn't had any change one way over the other for what they've needed talent or models for. They've needed promotional talent for their events. And they'll need some throughout the rest of the summer and into the fall...and as we keep going," he said.

Business as Usual

Among the events where Budweiser has had a local presence is SteelFist Fight Nights, a popular combat-sports gathering. There are also plans for the brand to continue playing a part in Utah's golf season, which typically runs from March or April to around November.

"I can speak for Salt Lake, that's where these events have been. The kickback hasn't been tremendous," Tate said. "For us in Salt Lake, it's really felt [like] business as usual from the events and promotional side. That's really where we're only tied to [Anheuser-Busch] in particular. Again, that's on a local level with the local distribution here.

"So what it's like for them nationally, I mean, we definitely could not speak to any of that. Because they're still sponsoring and hosting and being a part of the events that they had planned before their Bud Light campaign [with Mulvaney] and are still planning to afterward, as they just go through what their summer calendar was from an event and a promotional standpoint," he said.

On personal level, Tate has taken a neutral stance on Bud Light's partnership with Mulvaney. "What they choose to market and how they choose to market their brands [is their business]," he said. "We provide opportunities for people to work promotional elements.

"There's still people that enjoy the brand," he continued. "Having Bud girls or girls representing Bud Light, or any of the alcohol brands, isn't anything uncommon. I mean, it's been going on long before I've been doing this over the past 10-plus years, and I'm pretty confident it's going to be going on long after I'm done doing this.... We have a great working relationship with them."

With social media being the primary platform through which the boycott message against Bud Light and Budweiser has been spread, Tate noted the upsides and downsides of anybody having access to sizable audiences.

"I'm old enough to have been around in the pre-social-media era," he said. "Everybody definitely wants to have a voice. And I think social media is a great place for individuals and companies and resources to have a voice.... People put information out because it's something that's important to them or something that they feel that they're passionate about. And that's a great thing about social media, to one degree.

"We're also in a very divisive climate for a lot of different reasons in our day and age... I think that creates a challenge for other people and individuals," he said.

From a personal and a business standpoint, Tate added, "you just work within the parameters that you do have, [with] respect for the relationships that you have."