re: If this ends up killing the Bud Light brand, what is a comparable precedent?

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British CEO George Ratner called his products total crap at a conference in the early 1990s. They were cheaply-made cherry decanters that working-class people brought to feel fancy.

It caused 300 of his stores to close and his company had to change name.

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Gerald Ratner, a previous CEO who built the company from 130 stores to 2500, made possibly the most famous gaffe in twentieth-century British business when he explained to a major business conference that the reason why one of his products was so cheap was that it was "total crap". He then went on to unfavourably compare some of the company's earrings with a 99p prawn sandwich. His remarks were gleefully reported by the media. The company lost over 500 million pounds off its share price and consumers subsequently avoided the Ratner branded stores, nearly 300 of which were closed between January 1992 and May 1994 as the group went through a financial restructuring. Ratner resigned in November 1992, and the group changed its name to Signet Group plc in September 1993

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