With these two brewing titans joining forces like Rocky and Apollo Creed, Anheuser-Busch InBev now controls over a quarter of the world's beer market.
For those of you who aren't familiar with InBev, they are the makers of one of my favorite beers, Belgium's Stella Artois as well as Brazil's Brahma, Argentina's Quilmes, China's Sedrin, South Korea's Cass and Germany's Beck's to name a few.
According to Tom Pirko, president of California consulting firm Bevmark, "This is truly one of those win-win situations where everyone should be pleased as punch". InBev CEO Carlos Brito "got what he wanted — took down the big prize. And (Anheuser-Busch) shareholders got a major premium that would have been in doubt for a long time to come."
Call me crazy, but selling off a family owned company that has been around since the Civil War to please some greedy shareholders seems a bit, um, sad. You always thought of a Budweiser as an American beer brewed by an Ameican family. The "American Dream" in action. German's coming to the US an creating an empire to be run for generations.
It seems today that people are lazy. What happened to competition. Every major company teams up with the next so that 4 compaines in the world own everything. Microsoft might be merging with Yahoo!. I don't know. It just bothers me. Pretty soon Ford will merge with Toyota and the Yankees will join forces with the Red Sox. Well, let's not get carried away.
But, after only 2 years at the helm, August A. Busch IV has sold his family's empire. His great grandfather spun so hard in his grave that he popped up in China. Hey, at least he can have Sedrin while he's down there and feel half as good about it.
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