How Corona Became King: Mexican Beer in the Late Twentieth Century

As recently as 1890, Mexico produced very little barley-beer of its own, and what little it consumed was largely imported.  But by 1930, beer had become one of Mexico’s largest industries and just a few years later, it was the alcoholic beverage of choice for most Mexicans.  Beginning in the 1980s, corporate buy-outs led the Mexican brewing industry to become central to growth strategies of global conglomerates, including Anheuser-Busch InBev, and by 2011, Mexico had become the world’s largest exporter of beer.  This presentation will explore how Mexican brewers built an industry that, while in its early days was aimed at satisfying domestic markets, was positioned to become a global leader by the end of the century.  It will explore how the leading position of the Mexican brewing industry in transnational trade and corporate structures has historical roots in mid-century industrial policy, ambitious domestic technological innovation, and the transformation of Mexico into an exotic albeit desired “other” by its U.S. neighbors.

This presentation is significant because it explores the critical role of owners in the emergence of one industry that defied expected outcomes in this dependent, semi-peripheral economy as it opened to global markets beginning in the 1980s. It thereby can expand our understanding of the uneven dynamics of global business in the late twentieth century.  Moreover, it seeks to understand how earlier elite constructions of the modern Mexican consumer along with global campaigns that sought to reframe ideas about Mexico in the minds of foreign consumers (e.g. using marketing and legislation to challenge rumors spread by competitors about urine in Mexican beer) intersected with economic policies that together facilitated the eventual global export success of the Mexican brewing industry.