Bud Light's Super Bowl dig at rivals' corn syrup triggered a year of injunctions

During the February 2019 Super Bowl, Anheuser-Busch ran ads for Bud Light emphasizing that rival light beers Miller Lite and Coors Light are brewed using corn syrup, part of a roughly $30 million campaign built around Bud Light's own corn-syrup-free brewing process.

MillerCoors sued in March 2019, arguing the campaign had a 'nefarious purpose' to mislead consumers into thinking corn syrup remained in the finished beer, when it says the corn syrup is only a fermentation aid that doesn't survive into the final product. A federal judge partially agreed, barring specific language from future Bud Light ads in May 2019, then issuing a broader injunction in September 2019 that stopped Anheuser-Busch from using 'no corn syrup' claims and icons on Bud Light packaging altogether.

Anheuser-Busch appealed, and in 2020 the Seventh Circuit reversed, ruling the brewer was free to keep running the comparative campaign. What began as a Super Bowl ad had by then cost both sides more than a year of litigation, forced Bud Light to alter its packaging during the injunction period, and ended without the clear win either side had first claimed.