Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2020/08/26/how-is-corona-beer-doing-7-mon.html
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Brands, man. Brands.
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“Actually prospered” may not be true. The Daily Beast article doesn’t give numbers, and MarketWatch, in their July 30 report on the industry, points out that Modelo Group and Constellation Brands don’t break out sales numbers for Corona:
In reality the answer to “How is Corona beer doing 7 months into coronavirus?” is “we don’t know.” From MarketWatch: “Corona beer sales weren’t noticeably worse than any of its other brands.” That’s hardly “Actually prospered.”
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It’s too bad Corona virus wasn’t dubbed “Piss-tasting Swill 19”. Then they could have decrease the sales of Bud Light.
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I think that in the AIDS/AYDS case you’ve got a couple of things going on. First is the outright homophone-ia, but that’s surely compounded by what the two do or mean.
AYDS was supposed to help a person lose weight, and the horror is that for lots of folks, especially in the early years of the AIDS pandemic, rapid and unhealthy weight loss was an effect of the disease. AIDS Wasting Syndrome (or HIV Wasting Syndrome) is a very real thing:
It was also an effect of ‘the cure’, where AZT and other drugs would make you sick and nauseous, so you wouldn’t or couldn’t eat and put on weight.
Activists at the time (and now) had a number of responses… Medical Cannabis, for one. My pal Jay had a Marinol prescription that would help him keep food down.
AIDS activist zine Diseased Pariah News’s response was the column Get Fat, Don’t Die:
https://archive.org/stream/diseasedpariahnews/DPN%205#page/19/mode/2up
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Hopefully the odds of a Bitburger Virus epidemic are low…
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Keep in mind that Constellation Brands also dumped Ballast Point at the beginning of the year. That billion or so dollars may have had some effect on Constellation’s bottom line in the first quarter; it’s not all about the Corona.
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Obviously stupid people rule this planet. I mean, who else would think Corona beer causes the corona virus? I’m surprised no one has come up with the theory that the sun’s corona isn’t causing the virus. Really? Why else would they want us to stay indoors?
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Wasn’t a new Celebrity Deathmatch show supposed to happen? This matchup shound totally be in the first season…
Smart money’s on Coronavirus, but I think Corona beer has a chance, if it can wear a mask.
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I live in a fairly small town near a somewhat medium sized town. Trump visited the area, and the parking lot of the local grocery store looked like a rally for his base. I noticed in the beer aisle that all of the Corona cans were sold out. Might be coincidental, but it’s possible it’s a weird own-the-libs consumer effort.
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I would probably guess that they were hurt by it in the same way most other alcohol brands have. They may have made out better because their presence in on-premise is generally smaller than their off premise sales as rule.
Many alcohol brands are hurting as the majority of the market is in bars and restaurants. So even as retail sales have soared for many, it’s for the most part not making up for the overall shortfalls.
In terms of Constellation they have been hit pretty hard by shipping delays, production short falls due to all the shut downs, and additional quarantine time at the ports. Corona, Modello have been continually out of stock for long periods. This has caused spikes in sales for less popular Latin American brands. It may be offset by hoarding once it shows up again, but when you’re not on the shelf for 3 weeks or more that’s 3 weeks of lost sales in their heaviest season.
Lately I have noticed the large amounts (of Corona especially) delivered when they were most recently available are sitting far longer than usual. And I’m still shipping more of our alternatives, though less than I was when you couldn’t get Corona or Modelo.
It’s possible the situation could erode their sales long term, by introducing their drinkers to other options.
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Then there’s distilling-specific pain:
https://myemail.constantcontact.com/News-from-ADI---August-26--2020.html
Looks interesting…but…only in theaters Sep 7th? Showstopper there. No thanks.
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It came out in 2012. It’s on VUDU, Prime and Google play, Apple TV for a rental fee. Tubi on roku has it for free. I also think I saw a post to the full movie on Youtube.
It’s a quirky movie. The CGI could be better. But something about it just captures how I feel about brands in an anthropomorphized way. Which considering how we all talk about brands isn’t actually that far off.
The Ayds case doesn’t seem like a great analog, though. That was a weird niche product that ran a few TV ads here and there. I remember it, but barely (and I was their target demo at the time). The fact that the company didn’t rebrand it suggests that it didn’t make enough money to be worth the cost of doing that, so they quietly killed it. Corona, meanwhile, is a monstrously big worldwide brand. A wacky name coincidence seems unlikely do any more than a little temporary harm.
PS. There’s a typo in the OP- Ayds was an appetite suppressant.
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Another difference between Ayds and Corona: No one eats diet candy ironically.
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Seems like Corona Beer will be blocked just as effectively by a facemask unless you’re into butt chugging.
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Ayds was a niche product, not a familiar beer brand. I suspect it would have disappeared in a few years regardless of its name, joining all sorts of other 70s novelties like Space Food Sticks and Tang.
