When the CEO of Anheuser-Busch interviews potential employees of the world’s largest brewery group, he has a favorite question.
“Tell me about a time when you didn’t have success or things didn’t go as planned,” he likes to ask.
If Brendan Whitworth is ever asked the same question, he now has plenty of material to draw from.
Whitworth, 46, has seen his biggest brand – Bud Light – embroiled in a firestorm of controversy since they hooked up with transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney on April 1.
Mulvaney received her own special-edition beer to mark her year of transition from man to woman: a move that enraged Bud Light drinkers and caused Anheuser-Busch to lose $6 billion in value. Amid the excitement, factories across the United States have even been hit by bomb threats.
Brendan Whitworth, 46, has been CEO of Anheuser-Busch since July 2021. His company is now in the midst of a firestorm over his decision to work with transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney
Mulvaney announced the partnership with Bud Light herself on Instagram on April 1
To celebrate Mulvaney’s first year as an open transgender, Bud Light sent a tin with her face printed on it
Whitworth made the public statement on Friday, two weeks after the controversy began
Whitworth issued a statement on Friday, explaining, “We never intended to be part of a discussion that divides people.
“We have made it our mission to bring people together over a beer.”
The decision to team up with Mulvaney was reportedly made by a low-level marketing executive, but that hasn’t stopped Whitworth and his marketing vice president for Bud Light, Alissa Heinerscheid, from facing a barrage of criticism.
But few are better placed to navigate challenging lifelong situations than Whitworth – an “all American hero” and trainee doctor who joined the Marines – where he was a star athlete – and the CIA, the spies throughout the Middle East Osten recruited and dealt with. before going to Harvard Business School.
Whitworth has lived in the United States and was a registered Republican for most of his life.
“I was lucky enough to be born in the United States,” he said. “I felt like I had to pay that back — like I had a bit of debt that I had to pay.”
Whitworth grew up in the Alapocas Woods area just outside of Wilmington, Delaware, the son of physician Michael Whitworth and his wife Sara.
He attended Salesianum School, a Catholic high school in Wilmington, graduating in 1994 after leading the school’s football team to win the state championship. He was also a fiendish academic, earning just As in Honors Pre-Calculus.
Whitworth is featured in a feature on the athletic and academic star in his local Delaware newspaper in the early 1990s
Whitworth qualified for the Ironman World Championships — an ultra-triathlon held annually in Hawaii — but didn’t take his place, instead joining the CIA in 2001
Whitworth then decided to follow in his father’s footsteps and go to medical school and attend Bucknell University in Pennsylvania.
But midway through his college career, he had a change of heart.
Having always admired military and government service, he decided to join the Marines, attend officer cadet school and enlist as a second lieutenant in his senior year.
Whitworth played soccer at high school in Wilmington and at Bucknell University in Pennsylvania
His grandfather worked at the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) under President Hoover before directing training at Quantico, Virginia.
“So there kind of came an attachment to serving the country,” Whitworth told Fox News in an October interview.
At age 25, Whitworth, 6ft 2, 185 pounds, was stationed at Camp Pendleton, California and making headlines as an Ironman.
He ran the Marine Corp Marathon in a remarkable two hours and 55 minutes and the following year qualified for the Ironman World Championships – an ultra triathlon held annually in Hawaii.
Whitworth did not take his place, however: by then he had decided to leave the Marines after three years and join the CIA.
Post 9/11, from 2001 to 2006, Whitworth worked in some of the toughest places on earth – Pakistan, Tunisia, Iraq, at the height of the war on terror.
His LinkedIn describes his role as: “Specializing in recruiting and engaging human sources with access to vital information that has prevented and disrupted terrorist threats.”
Whitworth addresses an Anheuser-Busch meeting
The CEO of Anheuser-Busch is seen during a Belgian business mission to the United States in June 2022. AB-InBev, Anheuser-Busch’s parent company, is based in Belgium
His family was proud but concerned.
His older sister Kelty — an all-American swimmer at Delaware’s Ursuline Academy who then went to Harvard — told him it was time to step out.
“Even though she appreciated what I had done, like any protective sibling would, she kept saying, ‘Okay, you’ve been working eight years now… How do you feel about putting yourself first?'” he told Fox Business .
Whitworth described his sister as having a “strong, informed opinion” on his life.
He reluctantly agreed, but on condition that he would only go if he got to Harvard like she did.
“There are a lot of great business schools out there, but I always felt like they had something against me, too,” he explained.
“So I was like, ‘Okay, well, I’m going to go there’.”
He was preparing for his Graduate Management Admission Test in Baghdad and studying late at night after his CIA shifts ended.
In 2006 he came to Cambridge, Massachusetts.
Whitworth continued to play sports, particularly rugby.
But he focused on his studies and landed a top-notch job at PepsiCo after graduating.
In 2013 he joined AB-Inbev – the Belgium-based brewing company formed from the merger of US firm Anheuser-Busch with brewing companies around the world.
He rose through the ranks and led the Trade Marketing, Category and Sales Technology departments before becoming US Chief Sales Officer and eventually US CEO in November 2017.
“It’s hard to find some things that are as closely related to the United States as Anheuser-Busch is,” he said at the time of his appointment in July 2021.
Whitworth is seen in a Budweiser hoodie greeting drinkers at a fair
Whitworth and his wife live in a $7 million apartment in this Manhattan townhouse
Whitworth lives in Manhattan but regularly commutes to Anheuser-Busch’s St. Louis headquarters
“That passion for the country naturally combined with a passion for Anheuser-Busch and I grew up with Budweiser.
“I would bring Budweiser to college parties and not even really care what was in the keg.”
Whitworth credits his naval training with helping him rise to the top of American companies.
“They put you through a screening process to see if you had the skills to lead Marines,” he said.
“Then they give you what they think are the correct principles of leadership, and then they give you a platoon of Marines and you have to see if it all works.
“That early experience gave me an appreciation that I continue to build on — what it means to connect with, sell to, or market to someone from Philadelphia or San Antonio.”
It certainly made him a wealthy man.
Whitworth is said to make $12 million a year and lives with his wife Meredith in a $7 million apartment on the Upper East Side, near Central Park.
He will bring all his experience to bear as he helps Anheuser-Busch weather the Mulvaney storm.
“None of us get it right every time. We shouldn’t,” he told Business Insider in a November 2021 interview about his hiring method.
“But I want to see people get it wrong and then quickly move on to try to get it right.”