Jason Warner, Europe President, AB InBev comments on our 4Q22 and FY22 results and provides his outlook for Europe.
I am proud of our teams in Europe for delivering consistent financial and operational performance in 2022. Our simple, scalable growth formula in the region is focused on our Global and Premium/Super Premium Brands, which now represent more than 55% of our topline, an increase of +5pp vs. pre-COVID periods. We are leading and growing the category, with beer increasing share of throat versus wine and spirits helped by introductions of Stella Artois Unfiltered in the UK, one of our most successful beer launches and UK’s Product of the Year, and Corona Cero across Europe.
2022 also marked the arrival of our global e-commerce platform, BEES, to Europe with a launch in the UK and Belgium. For consumers our D2C platform PerfectDraft is now in more households than there are pubs and bars in the UK and France.
In the face of the humanitarian crisis in Europe, we rallied quickly to support our Ukrainian colleagues and the Ukrainian people. We produced 5 million cans of water to help people and donated $7million to humanitarian organizations. We also launched the Ukrainian beer Chernigivske across 14 global markets to bring an important part of Ukrainian culture to the world. All proceeds from these sales, including our customer’s own margins, were provided to humanitarian relief organisations.
I am forever grateful and proud of the hard work of our customers, colleagues across our breweries and front-line sales, and the full AB InBev team supporting Europe in delivering these results. Moving into 2023, our portfolio and proposition are stronger than ever. We will continue to create a future with more cheers through continued premiumization, digital transformation, and innovation.
About Anheuser-Busch InBev (AB InBev)
Anheuser-Busch InBev is a publicly traded company (Euronext: ABI) based in Leuven, Belgium, with secondary listings on the Mexico (MEXBOL: ANB) and South Africa (JSE: ANH) stock exchanges and with American Depositary Receipts on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE: BUD). As a company, we dream big to create a future with more cheers. We are always looking to serve up new ways to meet life’s moments, move our industry forward and make a meaningful impact in the world. We are committed to building great brands that stand the test of time and to brewing the best beers using the finest ingredients. From our European roots at the Den Hoorn brewery in Leuven, Belgium, we are now a geographically diversified brewery with a balanced exposure to developed and developing markets, we leverage the collective strengths of approximately 169,000 employees, including 13,500 in Europe. We have offices and breweries in 18 EU Member States and our Global Innovation Centre is also based in Leuven, Belgium. Follow us on Twitter at @abinbev_EU.
For more information about Anheuser-Busch InBev, please visit www.ab-inbev.eu
