Anheuser-Busch Pitches Ultra-Light Beer

Anheuser-Busch, maker of the nation’s No. 1 selling light beer Bud Light, will introduce a light beer with even fewer calories next week in Atlanta, Baltimore and Dallas, the brewer said Thursday.

The new beer Anheuser Light will have 75 calories, the lowest in any major light beer, said Gregg Billmeyer, director of new products. Most light beers have between 96 and 110 calories. The new beer goes on sale Monday.

It will be positioned as a mainstream, premiumpriced light beer, competing with Miller Lite and Coors Light.

Bud Light also falls into that category, with 110 calories, but Billmeyer said Anheuser Light would be targeted to an older audience more interested in the lower calories.

Light beers represent 36 percent of the total U.S. industry volume and the category is growing at a rate of 2.5 percent a year.