St. Louis Residents, Charities Nervous About Future

Many St. Louis residents and nonprofit organizations alike are nervous about what the St. Louis Post-Dispatch described today as a Kingdom under siege.

The “kingdom,” in this case, is Anheuser-Busch, while “under siege” describes the possibility that A-B shareholders will accept an unsolicited $47 billion takeover bid and cede control of the world’s largest brewer to Belgium-based InBev.

It’s understandable that residents might worry. After all, A-B is the nation’s largest brewer and jobs are at stake. But why are folks in the nonprofit community nervous? Because their funding futures — especially if InBev succeeds — remain uncertain.

According to A-B’s Community / Charitable Giving page, the brewer has contributed more than $370 million during the past decade to nonprofit organizations, both in St. Louis and elsewhere. Among those helped recently, according to recent news releases, were Hispanics, members of the military and China earthquake victims. What a foreign-owned brewer might contribute to local charities remains unclear, though one St. Louis television station appears to have raised a gloomy possibility.

NBC affiliate KSDK published an article (Anheuser Busch Buyout Could Cripple St. Louis Charities) on its web site May 28 (see Google News Search result graphic). Sometime during the past 16 days, however, station management appears to have decided to pull the article, perhaps realizing it might do more harm than good to their future relationships with whichever company owns the brewer during days to come.

Certainly, no one really knows how things will work out, but two glimmers of hope for St. Louisans did appear within a letter by Carlos Brito, InBev’s chief executive officer, published on the InBev web site.

The first glimmer of hope:

As part of its proposal, InBev envisions making St. Louis, MO the headquarters for the North American region and the global home of the flagship Budweiser brand. In addition, InBev has proposed to name the combined company to evoke Anheuser-Busch’s heritage, reflecting the strong history of Anheuser-Busch’s key brands. Given the limited geographical overlap between the two businesses and the efficiency of Anheuser-Busch’s brewery footprint in the United States, InBev would maintain all of Anheuser-Busch’s U.S. breweries.

The second glimmer of hope:

“We have the highest respect for Anheuser-Busch, its employees and its leadership, who have built the leading brewer in the U.S. and grown the iconic Budweiser brand. Together, we would draw on the collective expertise of both companies’ management and employees. We also recognize the great contribution of Anheuser-Busch’s wholesalers to the company’s success and would work closely with them, under the three-tier system, to create even greater excitement in the marketplace around the brands of both companies. The combination will create a stronger, more competitive, sustainable global company which will benefit all stakeholders.”

More later as we await the outcome of the A-B board’s “due diligence” on this important matter.

-- Bob McCarty Writes