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Bud Light suffers bloodbath as longtime and loyal consumers revolt against transgender campaign

Source image: https://www.foxbusiness.com/lifestyle/bud-light-suffers-bloodbath-longtime-loyal-consumers-revolt-transgender-campaign

Bud Light suffered a bloodbath this past weekend.

Consumers nationwide revolted against the nation’s top-selling beer brand after it stepped “recklessly” into the culture wars last week with its new spokesperson, transgender TikTok star Dylan Mulvaney, according to bar owners and beer-industry experts around the country.

“I think society flexes it muscles sometimes and reminds manufacturers that the consumer is still in charge,” Jeff Fitter, owner of Case & Bucks, a restaurant and sports bar in Barnhart, Missouri, told FOX Business.

BUD LIGHT SAYS PACT WITH TRANS ACTIVIST DYLAN MULVANEY HELPS ‘AUTHENTICALLY CONNECT WITH AUDIENCES’

“In Bud Light’s effort to be inclusive, they excluded almost everybody else, including their traditional audience.”

He cited sports fans, working people and women as loyal Bud Light consumers the brand suddenly excluded in its race to go woke. 

Dylan Mulvaney

Dylan Mulvaney poses at the opening night of the musical “Parade” on Broadway at The Jacobs Theater on March 16, 2023, in New York City.  (Bruce Glikas/WireImage / Getty Images)

Bud Light-maker Anheuser-Busch is headquartered in nearby St. Louis. 

But even Fitter’s bar witnessed a catastrophic decrease in sales of the hometown suds among loyal and local consumers this week. 

Sales of Anheuser-Busch bottled products dropped 30% over the past week, while draught beer plummeted 50%, the owner said.

“In Bud Light’s effort to be inclusive, they excluded almost everybody else, including their traditional audience.” — Bar owner Jeff Fitter

Similar stories are found around the country.

Bud Light normally outsells rival products Miller Lite and Coors Light 25 to 1 at Braintree Brewhouse in Massachusetts, a sprawling sports bar just outside Boston. 

KID ROCK SHOOTS UP BUD LIGHT CANS WITH RIFLE TO PROTEST DYLVAN MULVANEY PARTNERSHIUP: ‘F— BUD LIGHT’

Not this week. 

Eighty percent of Bud Light drinkers ordered something else this week, Brewhouse owner Alex Kesaris said — while the 20% who did order Bud Light “weren’t on social media and hadn’t heard yet” about its new transgender pitch person. 

Bud Light Knight

The Bud Light knight is seen interacting with fans in the stands during an NFL game between the Minnesota Vikings and Detroit Lions. Bud Light has prospered over the years marketing to sports fans. (Scott W. Grau/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images / Getty Images)

“They didn’t order it again,” he said, after other patrons told them about the Bud Light marketing misfire.

One pub in Hell’s Kitchen, a New York City neighborhood known for its large and vocal gay community, reported that Bud Light draft sales dropped 58% this week, while Bud Light bottle sales were down 70%.

BUD LIGHT’S MARKETING VP SAYS SHE WAS INSPIRD TO UPDATE ‘FRATTY,’ ‘OUT OF TOUCH’ BRANDING WITH INCLUSIVITY

Bud Light’s decision to dive into the culture wars was a “bad decision” that defied “virtually every rule in building brands and marketing,” a national beer-industry analyst told FOX Business.

He cited a nightmare scenario for Bud Light sales reps in Texas, where the brand has for years has sponsored a large weekly dart league with 100-plus players each Thursday night.

The bar sold only four 12-ounce Bud Light bottles this week. 

The bar typically sells though three kegs of Bud Light at the event — a total of 495 12-ounce pours. 

The bar sold only four 12-ounce Bud Light bottles this week, as the dart players held a mass protest against their league sponsor. 

Bud Light drinker

DJ Stephanie Loayza arrives at FIFA World Cup Finals Bud Light and Budweiser VIP Party at the Palms Casino Resort in Las Vegas, Nevada, in a traditional Bud Light promotion from past years. (Gabe Ginsberg/Getty Images for Bud Light and Budweiser / Getty Images)

“They’ve already done enough damage in one week to disrupt year-long sales projections,” a beer-sales representative who works with national beer retailers such as Costco told FOX Business.

“You don’t just make up those sales. People aren’t going to drink twice as much Bud Light the following weekend to recover the lost business.”

BUD LIGHT SILENT ON SOCIAL MEDIA AFTER DYLAN MULVANEY CONTROVERSY

For a brand as large as Bud Light, the public relations calamity already represents millions of lost dollars — even if the consumer revolt ended tomorrow.

“If we do not attract young drinkers to come and drink this brand there will be no future for Bud Light.” — Bud Light VP Alissa Heinerscheid

Bud Light is famous for hiring the best marketing people in the business, the national sales rep said. But this time they hired the wrong person, he indicated.

Bud Light vice president of marketing Alissa Heinerscheid said she was inspired to update the “fratty” and “out-of-touch” humor of the beer company with “inclusivity” in a March 30 interview with the podcast “Make Yourself At Home” podcast.

Bud Light baseball fan

The Bud Light guys poses for a photo during Game 6 of the World Series between the Washington Nationals and the Houston Astros on Tuesday, October 29, 2019, in Houston, Texas.  (Loren Elliott/MLB Photos via Getty Images / Getty Images)

But her effort to be inclusive excluded the people who matter most — Bud Light drinkers, according to St. Louis-area operator John Rieker. 

“It’s kind of mind-boggling they stepped into this realm,” Rieker, who owns Harpo’s Bar and Grill in Chesterfield, Missouri, told FOX Business. 

“You’re marketing to an audience that represents a fraction of 1% of consumers while alienating the much larger base of your consumers.”

His customers, many of them loyal Bud Light drinkers, are baffled by the brand’s lack of inclusivity.

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“It seems Bud Light has everything to lose and very little to gain,” as its current drinkers “are not real receptive to this new development,” Rieker said.

“I had a really clear job to do when I took over Bud Light, and it was, ‘This brand is in decline, it’s been in a decline for a really long time, and if we do not attract young drinkers to come and drink this brand there will be no future for Bud Light,‘” Heinerscheid said. 

“Sometimes you just want to drink a beer without getting a lecture on social or political commentary or someone’s sexual orientation.” — St. Louis hospitality consultant 

Bud Light sales actually have been declining for years. 

The brand is likely to be overtaken soon by Corona or Modelo as the nation’s top-selling beer brand, according to industry observers. 

The current ad campaign may hasten its demise with a self-inflicted wound, sources indicated.

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“Sometimes you just want to drink a beer without getting a lecture on social or political commentary or someone’s sexual orientation,” said Patrick Imig, a hospitality consultant in St. Louis.

FOX Business reached out to Anheuser-Busch for comment but did not hear back by publication time.

Source: https://www.foxbusiness.com/lifestyle/bud-light-suffers-bloodbath-longtime-loyal-consumers-revolt-transgender-campaign

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Ohio firefighters find 118-year-old time capsule buried in fire station: Here’s what was inside

A team of firefighters has uncovered treasure hidden in their fire department that’s nearly 12 decades old.

Captain Ryan Redmon and a group of six firefighters from the City of Marion Ohio Fire Department were on a mission to retrieve an old department cornerstone from a retired fire station that was about to be demolished, but they ended up finding something truly unexpected.

The Marion Fire Department (MFD) has recently been researching the history of their department, going back to 1848, by digging up some information — both figuratively and literally, Captain Redmon told Fox News Digital.

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On May 25, Redmon and the firefighters went down to the old Marion Fire Department Station No. 2, which was built in 1905, to excavate their department’s cornerstone for preservation purposes before the building was scheduled to be torn down.

MFD cornerstone 2

Captain Ryan Redmon and a team of six firefighters from the Marion Fire Department in Marion, Ohio, discovered a hidden time capsule dating back to 1905. Firefighter Andrew Niles is pictured above removing a brick. (City of Marion Ohio Fire Department)

After spending nearly 30 minutes on the excavation, Redmon and his men quickly realized the cornerstone was deeper into the building than anticipated, so they called in professionals to complete the removal.

As Redmon and his team were about to leave, they pulled out one last brick and saw a copper box fall out of the sandstone, Redmon shared.

Redmon and the other firefighters on the scene took it back to the station excited to show everyone their new discovery.

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“Obviously, everybody wanted us to open it right away, and we wanted to, trust me. It was killing us to see what was in there,” Redmon commented.

copper time capsule

The 118-year-old time capsule was hidden near the cornerstone of the retired fire station building that was set to be demolished. (City of Marion Ohio Fire Department)

The MFD has been working on the written history of their department, but nothing in their prior research led them to believe there would be a time capsule hidden in the 1905 fire station.

“We’ve done so much history work around the station and I feel like we’ve got a pretty good grasp on our past and where we’ve been, and [to] discover something like [this], there’s no written record of it,” Redmon stated.

“We scoured newspapers, we scoured old records [and] there was never any mention of a time capsule in there, so it was very exciting,” he added.

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The time capsule was placed near the cornerstone of the old MFD station on July 20, 1905, according to a letter found in the capsule written by the fire chief at the time, Redmon added.

men opening time capsule

Chief Chuck Deem (left) looks on as Captain Redmon (center) and Andrew Niles (far right) pry open the time capsule during a public ceremony on May 31.   (City of Marion Ohio Fire Department)

“Firemen aren’t exactly known for being gentle, delicate creatures with things,” Redmon joked. “So we took it to the historical society in town.”

The copper box had been soldered shut on the edge and wasn’t easy to pry open, according to Redmon.

On May 31, the MFD invited the residents of Marion to be a part of a public opening of the time capsule.

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Inside the 118-year-old copper box were dozens of well-preserved memorabilia referencing the department including: nine MFD badges from the “turn of the century,” an invitation to the 1878 “Northwestern Ohio Volunteer Fireman’s Association Fireman’s Games” (which is still held today), four newspapers from July 1905 and so much more, according to the City of Marion Ohio Fire Department Facebook page.

Redmon took note of the differences between the “turn of the century era” badges that had been found in the time capsule, detailing the difference in style and size.

“There has been talk about trying to back to that style now that we know that’s our history and that’s kind of where we came from. In the future, maybe we can go back to that,” Redmon commented.

One of Redmon’s favorite discoveries in the box was the letter from Chief McFarland, the department’s fire chief for almost 40 years, he added.

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“He has kind of got his touch on everything. To have an actual letter from him was very [exciting].”

Ohio time capsule split FINAL

Redmon is looking forward to making a new time capsule for the new fire station which will include an item from the newly found 1905 capsule. (City of Marion Ohio Fire Department)

Redmon gave a lot of credit to Andrew Niles, a firefighter on his team, who has been heading up the department’s historical research and was the one to open the time capsule.

One of the biggest takeaways for Redmon is knowing that he now has a tangible place in the history of the MFD.

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“I was becoming a part of history because I was involved in this opening and this finding,” he shared.

The MFD is planning on taking an item from the 1905 time capsule, most likely one of the badges, and placing it in a new time capsule that will be buried in the construction of the new fire station, Redmon added.

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The hope is that another 118 years will pass by before the new capsule is opened and someone will be able to discover a 236-year-old badge, paying homage to the history and legacy of the Marion Fire Department, Redmon said.

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On this day in history, June 7, 1942, Battle of Midway ends in decisive US victory

On this day in history, June 7, 1942, the Battle of Midway — regarded as one of the most decisive U.S. victories in its war against Japan — came to an end.  

The Battle of Midway was an Allied naval victory and a major turning point in World War II. 

The battle was fought between Japanese and American carrier forces near the Midway Atoll, a territory of the United States in the central Pacific, from June 4-7, 1942.

On June 4, 1942, the Battle of Midway began. 

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Midway Island is a fairly isolated atoll, so named because it is midway between North America and Asia in the North Pacific Ocean, according to National Geographic.

Midway’s importance grew for commercial and military planners, says the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). 

Battle of Midway

In this June 4, 1942, file photo provided by the U.S. Navy, the USS Astoria (CA-34) steams by USS Yorktown (CV-5), shortly after the carrier had been hit by three Japanese bombs in the Battle of Midway.  (William G. Roy/U.S. Navy via AP, File)

In the 1930s, Midway became a stopover for Pan American Airways’ “flying clippers” — seaplanes crossing the ocean on their five-day transpacific passage, the same source indicates.

Midway was an incredibly strategic location, multiple sources say. 

“The Imperial Japanese Navy planned to use it to secure their sphere of influence in the Pacific theater of the war,” according to National Geographic. 

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“The Japanese had not lost a naval battle in more than 50 years, and had nearly destroyed the American fleet just six months earlier in a surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii.” 

The American success at Midway was a major victory over the Imperial Japanese Navy. 

Pearl Harbor is about 1,300 miles east of Midway, says the same source.

In preparation, American military and intelligence forces worked together to defeat the Japanese. 

Battle of Midway Island

The Battle of Midway Island, which resulted in a major victory for the U.S. fleet. The USS aircraft carrier ‘Yorktown’ received a direct hit from a Japanese plane, which got through despite the heavy barrage put up by American destroyers.  (Keystone/Getty Images)

Code breakers were able to decipher Japanese naval code, allowing American leaders to anticipate Japanese maneuvers, notes National Geographic. 

Because of this, the U.S. Navy was then able to launch a surprise attack on the larger Japanese fleet in the area and the Battle of Midway turned the tide of the war, says the same source. 

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The American success at Midway was a major victory over the Imperial Japanese Navy as all four Japanese carriers — Akagi, Hiryu, Kaga and Soryu — had participated in the attack on Pearl Harbor, says the National WWII Museum.

The Battle of Midway is often referred to as the turning point of the war in the Pacific.

“Sinking those Japanese carriers represented a resounding defeat over the enemy fleet which had wrought such destruction only six months before,” the same source says.

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The Imperial Japanese Navy would not be capable of overcoming the loss of four carriers and over 100 trained pilots — and with the loss at Midway, the Japanese offensive in the Pacific was overturned and the United States began offensive action in the Pacific, says the National WWII Museum.

The Battle of Midway is widely considered the most decisive U.S. victory of that period.

It is often referred to as the turning point of the war in the Pacific.

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Midway Atoll has since been designated as a National Memorial to the Battle of Midway, says the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

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Invisible AI’s ‘intelligent agent’ cameras can see what autoworkers and machines are doing wrong

Tesla CEO Elon Musk often refers to the automobile factory as “the machine that builds the machine,” but there are plenty of human workers involved in even the most highly automated plants.

They remain a key part of the exceedingly complex process that is automobile assembly but need to operate as efficiently as their mechanical counterparts to keep cars and trucks coming off the line with a combination of quality and speed.

Weeding out issues and making sure everything is running smoothly has traditionally meant sending quality control personnel up and down the lines to get eyes on the action. But now there’s a way to automate that job with better results than ever before.

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Palo Alto-based Invisible AI was founded by veterans of the autonomous car industry who saw an alternative for the artificial intelligence-driven machine vision technology they were working on that could come to market long before the mass acceptance of self-driving cars.

invisible ai

Invisible AI’s cameras have two terabytes of storage, enough to capture two months of data. (Invisible AI)

The company designed a network of cameras that can monitor an assembly line in real time and spot even the smallest things going wrong.

“Productivity, safety and quality are always top of mind in manufacturing, especially auto,” Invisible AI CEO Eric Danzinger told Fox News Digital.

The self-contained units are equipped with stereoscopic vision and onboard processing that allows them to be easily set up in a factory without having to tap into the facility’s own networks.

Invisible AI workers

The cameras use stereoscopic vision that can monitor how workers are moving. (Invisible AI)

“Our AI is not just about watching one workstation but about getting that view across the line about where you’re hitting production bottlenecks, where you’re seeing deviations from how the work is supposed to be done and where you’re seeing issues like bad reaches that can cause physical issues for your workers,” Danzinger said.

The cameras don’t need to be programmed with the assembly process. They only have to scan a single, correct cycle, and then the system can determine if anything deviates from it later.

“Our AI system analyzes the video, from raw pixels, to understand the pattern of work that’s happening and then compares those patterns so we can tell if someone is following a standard,” Danzinger explained. “All of that is being done by an intelligent agent in the cameras so a person doesn’t have to.

“If you have 100 cameras on one section of an assembly, you are actually seeing in 3D the living, breathing line.”

invisible ai paint gif

The system can tell if a worker’s movements are deviating from the ideal process. (Invisible AI)

Pricing varies by application, but Danzinger said the cost is far less than bringing in a consulting team or trying to accomplish the same work manually, which really can’t be done given the scope of what the system is capable of. 

Since they’re self-contained, installing all the cameras can be done in a couple of days between shifts.

“Our system has become the place you can go to help frontline employees understand the work being done,” Danzinger said.

“There are a million things happening. People are sick, bad parts are coming from suppliers, machines are broken down. … To be able to know what’s going on, what’s the most crucial component to fix, how do I meet my numbers? That’s the most important thing.”

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Invisible AI has collected a roster of a dozen automotive parts suppliers and four original equipment manufactures as clients, including Toyota, which uses the system at a factory in Indiana.

Toyota declined to provide comment for this report, but Senior Engineer Jihad Abdul-Rahim said when the project was announced last year that “Invisible AI is not only helping us find opportunities for improvement on the assembly lines, but we’re also constantly finding new use cases for their technology, such as ergonomics analysis to proactively prevent injuries.”

Invisible AI dashboard

Users can use an app to get an overview or check the status at a specific point in the assembly process. (Invisible AI)

Danzinger said details about its other customers and how they are using the system is confidential and that Invisible AI can’t provide details on their behalf.

As far as privacy is concerned, the system doesn’t have facial recognition technology, and it can blur faces captured on video. But the point of it is to offer direct feedback, so it is not an entirely anonymized analytical tool.

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“Most of what we see is helping workers have a voice and raise their hand to say, ‘This is broken. We need help fixing it,’ and actually getting a response,” Danzinger said.

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