SAN MATEO, CALIFORNIA: The San Mateo-based marketing firm Captiv8, which specializes in connecting social media influencers with major consumer brands, has found itself in a state of "serious panic mode" following its involvement in Bud Light's ill-fated partnership with transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney. The controversy started after MAGA-hat-wearing Kid Rock posted a video shooting hails of bullets at packs of Bud Light after Mulvaney announced she was its latest brand ambassador.
An insider from Captiv8 revealed that employees were engaged in "a lot of chatter” about potential blowback the firm would face as a result of the botched campaign. "Internally, the company was in serious panic mode," the source said.
What is behind the Captiv8 firm?
Captiv8, founded in 2015 by Krishna Subramanian, a Silicon Valley investor who previously sold online ad network BlueLithium to Yahoo for $300 million in 2007, boasts a portfolio of working with major brands like Walmart, American Express, Twitter, and KraftHeinz. The eight-year-old marketing firm was responsible for introducing Anheuser-Busch to the 26-year-old transgender influencer.
However, it remains unclear if Captiv8 was also responsible for the creation of the infamous Bud Light beer can featuring Mulvaney's image, or if they played a direct role in producing her TikTok video. Following the initial panic triggered by the Mulvaney crisis, Captiv8 appears to have returned to "business as usual," according to the insider.
Anheuser-Busch InBev faces scrutiny and declining sales in wake of botched campaign
Anheuser-Busch InBev, the parent company of Bud Light, has mostly remained tight-lipped about the failed Mulvaney campaign. However, in April, the company placed two executives, Alissa Heinerscheid, the vice president of marketing, and her boss, Daniel Blake, on leave. Anheuser-Busch informed distributors that Mulvaney's beer can was not produced by the company or in any of its facilities and that the "third-party" ad agency responsible for the Mulvaney video had to be terminated, as reported by several distributors.
“Ad agencies send out hundreds of influencer kits a year, some of which have a customized can included. This was one of those situations,” a distributor based in Texas told New York Post in April. Anomaly, a New York ad firm known for producing Super Bowl ads, was later retained by Anheuser-Busch as the creative agency for the Bud Light brand. A spokesperson for Anomaly said it “was not involved in any way with the Dylan Mulvaney campaign for Bud Light.”
Recent sales figures have reflected Bud Light's struggles, with the brand experiencing its worst week ever, witnessing a 25.7% decline during the week ending May 20. This significant drop, marking the sixth consecutive week of declining sales, puts Bud Light's position as the top beer brand in the US at risk. In contrast, rival Modelo Especial saw a 9.2% surge in sales for the same period, according to data from Bump Williams Consulting and Nielsen IQ, narrowing the sales gap between the two brands.
