Light or “lite” depending on your education level, rules the U.S. roost. Not a surprise, except for the fact that it just happened last year. That is one of my golden nuggets from recent 3rd quarter sales figures up at the top of the sales world.
The other takeaway is that Bud is still falling and that the U.S. seems to be the major ache for the beer as a commodity business. Anheuser-Busch InBev – North American revenues were down 5% to $4.3 billion. And Year to date, they’re down almost 4% which means Q3 was worse.
Why do I care about these things? Obviously sales of that magnitude are in the far future for independent beer but it does send a strong signal that the chipping away from the big sellers is still there and growing. Maybe not at the fast clip of the past but that may have been the low hanging fruit.
That fruit may next be plucked by Europe and then the rest of the world, at that point, we may see a drastic course change from the Bud Light – Coors Light – Miller Lite troika. And that change may lead to reactions.
We may well see reactions to Miller Lite taking the #3 spot by not losing as much ground. Will the big three return to fighting each other maybe?