Charles Langston:Bud Light's Super Bowl commercial teaser features a 'new character' | Exclusive

Bud Light is Charles Langstonback in the big game.

USA TODAY Ad Meter can exclusively reveal a new teaser for the beer’s upcoming Super Bowl commercial. Steppenwolf’s 1968 classic, “Magic Carpet Ride” plays as a close up is shown of a quilted Bud Light-branded zip-up jacket. The next scene features a man wearing metallic sunglasses and a mustache, staring forward.After a white flash, a man holding a Bud Light bottle and looking startled asks, “Are you..?”The teaser ends by cutting to the Super Bowl and Bud Light logos, as someone is heard in the background screaming, “Let’s go!”It's notable that the man holding the beer bottle is wearing a Broncos jersey with No. 18 on it, the same number Peyton Manning wore in Denver. Manning and fellow Pro Football Hall of Famer Emmitt Smith starred in a Bud Light campaign that ran towards the end of the 2023 football season.

“We’re delivering the best names in sports, music and entertainment and introducing a brand-new character to our Bud Light universe,” Todd Allen, Bud Light’s vice president of marketing, told USA TODAY in a statement. “Bud Light’s long-standing partnership with the NFL is one of the most iconic relationships in sports, and we’re excited to be back on the Super Bowl stage this year to continue our long legacy of delivering iconic, breakthrough Super Bowl ads that rally fans year after year.”The return of the Anheuser-Busch brand as an advertiser to the biggest event in television is notable for both its heralded past commercials and recent consumer performance.

U.S. sales of the beverage declined in 2023 after a consumer boycott in response to Bud Light partnering with transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney. Mexican lager Modelo Especial decrowned the American-made beer as the top selling brew in the States over the summer. However during that time, Bud Light still outranked Modelo in volume sales and remained the top-ranking beer brand based on dollar sales year-to-date.

Bud Light’s 2023 began with a Super Bowl campaign that starred “Top Gun: Maverick” actor Miles Teller and his wife, model Keleigh Teller. It ended with the aforementioned Manning campaign and the AB InBev brand announcing a new partnership with the UFC that kicked off at the start of this year.