Anheuser-Busch might be sold soon...

A Belgian brewer made a $46 billion bid for AB today. AB is mulling it over. What would this mean for the parks, if this goes through?

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080611/ap_on_bi_ge/anheuser_busch_inbev

Interesting.

Considering the fact that AB always brags about being the only American beer company run by Americans. (taking jabs at Miller).

The parks would absolutely be sold, I suspect. Not every company is happy to dabble in things far from their core business. I think AB does it because it's good PR and makes the company that sells alcohol look they're heavily into conservation. I'm not saying they aren't, but it's certainly good for their image. Another company may not think so.

$46B? Really? That seems really... excessive.

Jackasses.

InBev sold off Rolling Rock to Anheuser Busch, who moved them out of Latrobe, PA where they'd been since its inception in the 30's, because they didn't want to deal with smaller brands.

Now they're buying AB.

Looks like a good investment opportunity for Parque Reunidos! :)

I think it is quite safe to say that should this deal go through the parks would no longer be part of the company. Now the question is who buys em?

I could see them being spun off into their own company, they have their own brand (well Sea World does) and they are well run, profitable parks and SF and CF are too much in debt to buy right now. No one else in the industry wants to/could afford to buy them.

I honestly hope that you arent right Jeff, but I hope if this does go down, like it sounds like it will, is there a chance that they will let the people who are running the parks now, continue to run the parks, without being affiliated with this company?

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Touchdown said:
No one else in the industry wants to/could afford to buy them.

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Didn't Disney at one point want to build a park in Williamsburg?

What I would be most disappointed with is that its another American Company potentially being bought out by a foreign owner.

Well SWO would defiantly fit in with WDW (its so close, and they don't have a marine park yet.) But I don't see how/why Disney would want the any to the other properties, Williamsburg you could sort of turn into a resort (via Kingsmill) but Tampa and San Antonio are not resort material, and I assume (never been there) neither is San Diego.

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eightdotthree said:

What I would be most disappointed with is that its another American Company potentially being bought out by a foreign owner.

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So, by the same logic, I assume you don't want foreign companies bought by a U.S. owner, right?

(something about goose/gander......)

"Anheuser-Busch is the last large-scale American brewery to be majority owned and operated in the United States."

I want American businesses to remain American owned and located. Is that a bad thing?

No, but it may well be a quaint, outdated thing.

Increasingly, businesses have nothing to do with countries.

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kpjb said:

InBev sold off Rolling Rock to Anheuser Busch, who moved them out of Latrobe, PA where they'd been since its inception in the 30's, because they didn't want to deal with smaller brands.

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It was only Rolling Rock. It's not like it was a good beer in the first place. :)

-Tambo

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Brian Noble said:No, but it may well be a quaint, outdated thing.Increasingly, businesses have nothing to do with countries.

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Seems to me it wasn't THAT long ago that governments held the power over companies operating within their borders. Now, that situation has done a COMPLETE reversal, and companies more and more dictate the terms and conditions...governments are left with an unwinnable dilemma - acquiesce or risk the devastation of job losses.

I could see Disney buying the parks and promptly closing BGA and closing or selling SW in San Antonio, and rebranding the remaining parks.

Back at A-B, would the Clydesdales lose their job to Belgians or Friesians?

Why on earth would they buy BGA only to close it? Don't you know that nobody, in the history of the planet, has ever bought out the competition in order to shut them down?

*sarcasm* (but not at you, Bogeyman!)

Or I could see A-B seeing this as a bad move and not follow through with it...

^ I agree but have been proven wrong before. It seems like A-B has way too much pride and history as a family owned business to sell it to a foreign company. It could be all marketing too.

^^ As if Disney has a real competitor in BGA. They are more like the little kid down the street that wants to play with the big boys, but gets ignored. :)

The Busch family, who own only 4%, have many poison pills to fight with. If, and if they lose, they won't go down without a fight.