Some Americans Are Threatening To Stop Drinking Jim Beam Now That It's Owned By A Japanese Company
So yesterday, when Japanese liquor giant Suntory announced it is purchasing Beam Inc. - which distills Jim Beam and Maker's Mark - Americans did the only thing that seemed right. They complained on social media.
And people hit Beam where it hurt, by threatening to switch to Jack Daniel's.
There's a lot more where that came from on Beam's Facebook page.
This style of nationalism might be a little misplaced. Shouldn't we be proud that foreign companies want to buy American brands? Presumabley Suntory bought Jim Beam because they liked it. It's the same reason that Budweiser still feels pretty American years after it merged with Belgian InBev.
Plus, people might be surprised to learn what's already foreign-owned.
"Consider 7-11 stores, Popsicle ice pops, and Frigidaire appliances," writes the New Yorker's Vauhini Vara. "All American icons that are owned, respectively, by Japanese, Anglo-Dutch, and Swedish companies." From the New Yorker:
Certain brands serve as especially potent symbols of American culture; Budweiser and Jim Beam, each more than a century old, are among them. When foreign companies move to acquire such brands, it naturally triggers a cultural anxiety about the decline of American influence. (In a December report, the Pew Research Center found that more than half of the people it surveyed believed that the U.S. "plays a less important and powerful role as a world leader than it did a decade ago.")
And as Vara notes, if anything, Suntory wants to spread American whiskey to the rest of the world. Maybe that should be a source of pride.