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Notes -
As someone who works in a bar, I'm somewhere between amused and annoyed by the Bud Light thing (much as I was annoyed as a pizza delivering college student to hear about John Schnatter from people blissfully unaware of Tom Monaghan's politics). The place I work at is one of the more liberal bars in town, or at least liberal enough that Bud Light is one of our worst sellers. We keep it in stock for the occasional large party of tradesman types who will come in and drink lots of Bud/Bud Light, but for whatever reason Bud is so "redneck" coded that our patrons (mostly Millennials; happy hour is mostly Boomers) mostly don't touch it. Why Miller Lite isn't coded this way, why our customers have no idea that Kid Rock name-dropped PBR in a song, and why Yuengling's owner actually having endorsed Trump seems to have been forgotten all escape me. Caveat here: the local Miller/Yuengling/PBR distributor sends us 16oz cans for the same price as Bud sends us 12oz bottles, a price differential that only Michelob Ultra (Greeks and middle-aged former Greeks are loyal to it.) seems able to overcome (darkly amusing, as IMO Mich Ultra is even worse than Bud Light; Hell, I'd rather drink Natty.).
I've heard lots of jokes about Bud Light that get old fast, one regular who repeatedly announced his boycott in annoying fashion, but otherwise I sell no Bud Light and tons of Miller/PBR/Yuengling as per usual. I've heard more dramatic things from the sort of bars that do sell Bud Light (and wouldn't be surprised; this is an SEC college town), but people say lots of things. Concerning Gen Z, they either choke down $2 PBRs like the rest of our budget-conscious customers or drink fancy crafts (Sours seem to be in style now and IPAs out of fashion/relegated to alcoholic Millennials.)/mixed drinks. Hard kombucha is a surprisingly big seller along with the expected ciders for people (usually young women) who don't like beer. We sell surprisingly little Whiteclaw (mostly to one regular, and then the bar manager drinks it on the job because it looks like water in a cup); maybe it's class-coded in a negative way toward dilettantes in the same way Bud Light is.
For fun, my preferred domestic/InBev product (aside from Elysian Space Dust IPA) is Natty Light, because it's cheap, IMO no worse than other light beers, and does its job, i.e. one or two to finish off a night upon returning home from the bar won't get me too fucked up to work the next day. I'm not tough enough to drink Natty Ice any more, and as a rule I don't keep liquor at my house (My drunken idea of a good gin and tonic is not conducive to being on-time/sober enough to work the next morning, and I frown upon getting drunk and morose by myself these days.)
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