Comments for Anheuser Agrees to InBev Deal »
Posted By Emmanuel70 1 year, 5 months ago in Business & FinanceAnheuser-Busch Cos. agreed to be acquired Sunday by InBev NV for about $52 billion, creating the world's largest beer maker and placing an iconic American company in the hands of a Belgian-Brazilian giant.
Read Full Story at online.wsj.com »
RSS Join the Discussion
+ Add CommentComments So Far: 76
-
Neutral
capn_caveman1 year, 5 months ago
This comment is below the standard viewing threshold View It »
Honestly, I can understand why this happened. When it comes down to it - it's all about the $$$.
But at this point it's hard for me to grasp. Budweiser is American beer and always has been. To be honest, I feel kind of 'icky' about this. The same way I would feel if my favorite baseball team sold out to a foreign company.
Reply-
Neutral
gamahuche1 year, 5 months ago
This comment is below the standard viewing threshold View It »
Your first two sentences are both uncontroversial and right on the money.. After that you go astray!
The name Budweiser comes from the Czech lands; Budweis is the German name for Ceske Budejovice, a town which has, you guessed it a long and proud tradition of brewing - though not nearly as long as many other towns in the Czech lands.
For the last 15 years or so AB has desperately been trying to gain control of one of the largest breweries in the Czech lands, which manufactures a beer called Budvar in Czech,Budweiser in German, in light and dark variants and with some extra-strong beers and non-alcoholic variants thrown in. Their efforts have been thwarted - and are further confused anyway because there is a second less-known but older brewery in the town which also uses the Budweiser name.
Reply-
-
-
Neutral
jimdoze1 year, 4 months ago
This comment is below the standard viewing threshold View It »
Grandpa, born of Czech immigrants, grew his own hops and brewed his own beer. The hops still grows on the farmstead, though no one has used it since WWII days.
When I toured the old sod in the early 80s, I was taken by how the standard working man's breakfast was a bowl of tomato soup, a chunk of bread and large glass of beer. Beer is very deeply ingrained in the Czech culture.
Reply-
Neutral
antibrainwasher1 year, 4 months ago
This comment is below the standard viewing threshold View It »
The sale is in part because the dollar has fallen, making other curencys able to come into this country and buy anything they want. Its multinational companies that don't deal in dollars that are reaping the globalization buck now. America, for sale. America, bankrupt. america, only thing we do great is spend 3 times as much as anyone else on our evangelical crusader airforce and navy and army.
The stockholders of Bud made a killing, I'll bet Cindy McSenile, the 100 million dollar big liquor heiress, made out just fine.
The budget for Alkida per year is 30 million, that won't even buy one transport helicopter. We spent 1 trillion dollars fighting a 30 million dollar unorganized arab religion.
Reply
-
-
-
-
-
Neutral
DropkickaLib1 year, 4 months ago
This comment is below the standard viewing threshold View It »
Who'd have thought that taste in beer would bring so many on both ends of the political spectrum together? I've often thought that I should buy any Leftie from this board a beer if I met any of them, just to make up for the debates.
Reply -
-
-
-
Neutral
mark-stevens1 year, 4 months ago
This comment is below the standard viewing threshold View It »
The Budweiser name was stolen from a European brewery. The Americam Budweiser can't be sold in certain parts of Europe.
I quit drinking beer years ago, our local breweries got bought out and went to hell in taste.
Busch sells twice as many barrels as its nearest competitor the Miller Brewery... so much for American's taste
caverman... "The same way I would feel if my favorite baseball team sold out to a foreign company."
The Seattle Mariners are owned by Nintendo, a very Japanese company!
Reply -
-
-
-
birddog54Comment removed: Abusive12 Replies
-
libsRfunnyComment removed: Hard Banned1 Reply
-
-
Neutral
jimdoze1 year, 4 months ago
-
-
libsRfunnyComment removed: Hard Banned
-
-
-
-
Neutral
nostalgia1 year, 5 months ago
This comment is below the standard viewing threshold View It »
"InBev's corporate culture is focused heavily on cost controls"
I think we all know what this means
Unions offer grim reports on InBev
Union leaders representing InBev workers in Brazil, Canada and Europe have a simple message for Anheuser-Busch employees if InBev takes control of the St. Louis-based brewery: Watch out.
"They should worry, because the production is going to be concentrated and the work force reduced," says Siderlei Oliveira, president of Brazil's 1.2 million-member food workers union, citing a reduction in Brazil's brewery workers to 13,000 from 23,000 since the 1990s. "This is the strategy that they have."
http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/news/stories.n...
Reply-
Neutral
nostalgia1 year, 5 months ago
This comment is below the standard viewing threshold View It »
This was also reported:
"Shareholders also should be aware that InBev, through a subsidiary, has a significant partnership with the government of Cuba to produce and distribute products in Cuba. InBev has not commented on how that would impact business with Anheuserâ;;Busch's customers, nor on its ability to complete an acquisition under U.S. laws that affect acquisitions of U.S. companies by foreign companies."
http://dealbook.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/07/07/th...
Reply -
coreyspringComment removed: Retracted by user
-
-
Neutral
nikkibabe1 year, 5 months ago
This comment is below the standard viewing threshold View It »
Honestly, the whole world does not hate Cuba like USA. Canada has booming business with Cuba and so does lot of other countries around the world. If they don't have capitalism it does not mean the country is bad.
Talking about capitalism, if someone looks at the way US is going downhill, well, they can live without it.
Reply-
libsRfunnyComment removed: Hard Banned2 Replies
-
-
-
-
-
-
Neutral
dissent1 year, 4 months ago
This comment is below the standard viewing threshold View It »
we do have some kind of prisoners but we don't know if they're political or not coz they haven't been charged.... for a very very long time. besides, imprisonment for political reasons is too specific. suspicion fed by rumor, tattle tales and paranoia will do
Reply
-
-
-
-
-
-
newbie0420Comment removed: Hard Banned2 Replies
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
Neutral
jimdoze1 year, 4 months ago
This comment is below the standard viewing threshold View It »
Considering the new owners, wouldn't it be more appropriate for the Clydesdale to be replaced with some good, solid Belgians.
http://www.thebige.com/horseshow/draft/hs_draft...
Reply
-
-
Neutral
Hobe1 year, 4 months ago
This comment is below the standard viewing threshold View It »
Anheuser Agrees to InBev Deal
John and Cindy should be quite happy, they are even more weathy than one could ever imagin....
Cindy Budwiser and the ketchup lady hinze Kerry have landed trophy Senator Husband's.
Both kerry and McCain are lifer do-nothing senator's in washington....
After all their years in washington, NOW they want to correct all the Garbage they created....
Vote the Lifers out of office, they are OWNED by Special Intrest and do very well financially at the expense of Hard working American taxpayer's...
Stop the corruption, vote them out....
Reply -
-
Neutral
chevydog1 year, 4 months ago
This comment is below the standard viewing threshold View It »
Usually you're correct. But I haven't seen much about what execs are going to be paid to go away. I rather suspect that there won't be many of these. The beer market has been a tough one for a while; but AB has done better than most large brewers. Their flat profitability can be laid more at the market's feet than their overstaffing or overpaying. But new owners don't always think logically about this stuff.
Think that where jobs may be at risk is in the smaller regional breweries; and perhaps AB's entertainment ventures. AB in 10 years will be different than it is now.
Remember that the number of large breweries and brewing companies have been declining for a long time. The craft brewers held up the numbers end; but their capacity is by definition small. This is just the most recent step in something that's been happening for a while.
Reply
-
-
Neutral
ConquerorWyrm1 year, 4 months ago
This comment is below the standard viewing threshold View It »
I long ago stopped purchasing anything by Anheuser Busch...long ago when I heard just how much this company spends to ensure that cannabis remains illegal so as to not interfere with their market share.
Sad and sick, really...
Some simple numbers:
rough number of deaths attributed to alcohol each year = 85000
rough percentage of alcohol sales which is beer = 55%
market share of Anheuser Busch in beer sales = 48.2%
Therefor, roughly 22440 people each year are murdered by Anheuser Busch and their products.
Number of deaths attributed to cannabis (ever!) = 0
Anheuser Busch gets none of my money, ever...
Reply -
-
Neutral
joey-evans1 year, 4 months ago
This comment is below the standard viewing threshold View It »
There are a good number of small places in the U.S. that make and distribute fantastic tasting beer....places like Avery out of Colorado, Bear Republic out of Cali, Rogue out of Oregon and many others....much better than the mass produced swill that is promoted everywhere you turn. There are quite a few more outstanding imports such as Chimay, Duvel and St. Bernardus from Belgium to name a couple and don't forget the many great German made beers now available. Also England has quite a few of their own to be proud of such as Samuel Smith and Young's. Unfortunately, most people haven't heard of these and when given the opportunity to taste some of them are turned off because they are so used to the commercial crap they usually drink. Oh, and I agree with whoever said Samuel Adams, they make a wonderful lineup and it is what I usually order when I find myself in a place that doesn't have better.
JOEY EVANS
Reply -
Neutral
hyperbola1 year, 4 months ago
This comment is below the standard viewing threshold View It »
Get used to it. Since Bush became president the dollar has fallen by 65% relative to the Euro. American companies now look cheap to Europeans.
Apart from that, if Americans really believe in globalization, then in the end the percentage of companies in America that are owned by Americans should be about the same as our percentage of global business - 20%.
When a Chinese oil company can drill off of the American coast, then we will have full globalization.
Reply -
Neutral
hyperbola1 year, 4 months ago
This comment is below the standard viewing threshold View It »
Get used to it. Since Bush became president the dollar has fallen by 65% relative to the Euro. American companies now look cheap to Europeans.
Apart from that, if Americans really believe in globalization, then in the end the percentage of companies in America that are owned by Americans should be about the same as our percentage of global business - 20%.
When a Chinese oil company can drill off of the American coast, then we will have full globalization.
Reply -
Neutral
Natureboy1 year, 4 months ago
This comment is below the standard viewing threshold View It »
Apart from its being a symptom of all things american being up on the auction block, it's hard for me to feel bad about this - I mean, really, isn't it a lot like Chrysler being bought out by Toyota or even Porche? Things can only get better.
But still, I have a mental image of Joe Six-pack taking a big glug of the new Bud and spitting it out, crying in rage and indignation "Dammit, these stinking Belgians put beer in my p!ss-colored water!"
Reply -
hefaa1Comment removed: Hard Banned
loading ...
Add a Comment
Sign In With Your Propeller Account
Please keep your comments relevant to this story.
To create a live link, simply type the URL (including http://) or email address and we will make it a live link for you. You can put up to 3 URLs in your comments. Line breaks and paragraphs are automatically converted — no need to use <p> or <br /> tags.