Falwell Lights Into Budweiser

Ad in Gay Magazine Sparks Call-In Campaign

Jerry Falwell can never be too vigilant. With Tinky Winky, the signs were fairly obvious: The glittery purse, the purple triangle over his head, the gyrating hips, even the name all but guaranteed that the little Teletubby would be a target of anti-gay rhetoric. But Budweiser? The King of Beers?

Who would have guessed that Anheuser-Busch, of all red-blooded American entities, would be next? Yet here it is running an ad that "presents two Bud-drinking homosexual men in a hand-holding posture," as Falwell reported last month in Falwell Confidential, his e-mail newsletter.

Actually, neither of the men is shown drinking a Bud. But they really are holding hands.

"Pro-family Americans are terribly concerned about homosexual images coming into our homes through reckless advertising campaigns," Falwell complained. But so far, the ad ("Be yourself and make it a Bud Light") has run only in EXP, a small gay biweekly magazine in St. Louis, and is scheduled to run only in other gay publications. It showed up in the homes of "pro-family Americans" because Falwell sent it to them. But never mind the details. What's at stake here, Falwell writes, is no less than preserving "the Judeo-Christian standards on which this nation was founded." To that end, he called on his supporters to make their opinions known.

When it ran the ad in the April 21 issue of EXP, Anheuser-Busch set up a toll-free line for callers to register support for the new campaign. Falwell complained that the company hadn't set up a number to register opposition. So he published the company's regular toll-free customer service number and urged all his Falwell Confidential friends to call.

Within 24 hours, Anheuser-Busch had set up a separate line for callers to register opposition to the campaign; Falwell urged pastors to tell their congregations to call. In response, gay rights activists sent messages through online chat rooms urging people to fight Falwell's "anti-homosexual crusade" by calling that toll-free support number.

Anheuser-Busch will not say how many calls either of its 800-numbers has logged.

"It's surprising to us that one print ad placed in select gay-oriented magazines has attracted attention," a company spokesman said in a statement, adding tactfully that "today's consumer is not one of a specific gender, race, geography or orientation. We appreciate and respect the views of all our customers."

Falwell's latest crusade is quaint considering its choice of target. For at least a decade, Anheuser-Busch, like many other American companies, has zeroed in on consumers of a specific orientation, namely the gay one (the Bud Light campaign is overseen by the firm's "alternative lifestyle" manager).

Gay people are a demographic catch for alcohol companies because they tend to be social, and for the most part don't have children and stop going out once they reach a certain age.

By the standards of gay-specific marketing, this particular Bud ad is "quite tame," says Howard Buford, president of Prime Access, an agency that helps mainstream companies market to gay and ethnic audiences.

A decade ago marketers tried innuendo, with fairly limited results. A Parliament cigarette ad grafted a second man onto a scene with a man and a woman, so you couldn't be sure who was with whom; Paco Rabanne cologne pictured a note on a guy's dresser mirror that was scrawled in gender-ambiguous handwriting; a furniture ad showed two men buying couches together, sitting at opposite ends.

More recently, though, marketers have given up on the subliminal. In a Dolce & Gabbana clothing ad, the two men sit close on a couch, clutching each other. In a Diesel jeans ad two men are locked in a ravenous kiss.

For several years Budweiser has been running in gay magazines an ad called "Closet Case," showing a case of beer in a closet. This year the company has come out: The hand-holding ad is designed to announce that Bud Light is the "Proud Sponsor of St. Louis PrideFest '99" and the official sponsor of the gay rodeo circuit.

Falwell looks to have a dry and busy summer.