Monday, January 05, 2009
Bye Bye Free Beer
Have those Belgians no heart?
Busch/InBev has announced that there will be no more free beer at SeaWorld and Busch Gardens Africa, the St. Louis Business Journal is reporting.
The beer dispensing area at the SeaWorld Hospitality Center will be closed as of February 1 and converted into a restaurant; the Tampa equivalent will close as of the end of January and reopen with a "new menu".
Busch spokesman Fred Jacobs tried to make it sound like a logical move.
Nice try, Fred. I guess the lack of broad appeal explains the long lines at the Hospitality Centers.
Bud boycott, anyone?
Busch/InBev has announced that there will be no more free beer at SeaWorld and Busch Gardens Africa, the St. Louis Business Journal is reporting.
The beer dispensing area at the SeaWorld Hospitality Center will be closed as of February 1 and converted into a restaurant; the Tampa equivalent will close as of the end of January and reopen with a "new menu".
Busch spokesman Fred Jacobs tried to make it sound like a logical move.
"The hospitality centers had pretty limited appeal because it was for patrons who were of legal drinking age who wanted beer," he said. "We were looking for something that had a broader age appeal."
Nice try, Fred. I guess the lack of broad appeal explains the long lines at the Hospitality Centers.
Bud boycott, anyone?
Labels: anheuser bush, Busch Gardens Africa, free beer, inbev, seaworld orlando
Friday, January 02, 2009
SeaWorld Saved by the Bad Economy?
There is now speculation that any potential sale of the Busch theme parks has been back-burnered by the stalled economy.
Frankly, I don't think anyone knows.
“Clearly InBev is not a theme park operator,” Winston said. “So there will probably be some kind of play on their part for disposing of the theme park division, but it’s just a timing issue, and I think financing is the boogeyman right now.”
Frankly, I don't think anyone knows.
Labels: anheuser bush, inbev, seaworld orlando
Friday, June 20, 2008
Buffett Backing InBev Bid?
There's a report that Warren Buffett, Anheuser-Busch's biggest shareholder, is looking kindly on the InBev offer for the company.
Could be just a rumor, but the "business logic" of the deal is looking more and more inevitable to me.
Of course, there's nothing to say that InBev would "sell the theme parks for parts," as a friend of mine put it, but that seems to be the pattern in this sort of deal.
Warren Buffett, the world's richest man and chairman of Berkshire Hathaway Inc., plans to tell Anheuser-Busch Cos. chief August Busch IV that he supports Belgian brewer InBev's proposed $46.3 billion takeover offer of the Budweiser brewer, according to an article Belgian newspaper De Standard posted on its Web site Tuesday.
Could be just a rumor, but the "business logic" of the deal is looking more and more inevitable to me.
Of course, there's nothing to say that InBev would "sell the theme parks for parts," as a friend of mine put it, but that seems to be the pattern in this sort of deal.
Labels: anheuser bush, inbev
