Swamp Thing

You'd figure Anheuser-Busch would know a thing or two about swamps, having croaked and kibitzed with all those frogs, lizards and ferrets.

Evidently, you'd be wrong. The St. Louis brewer had residents of Jacksonville, Fla., reaching for their atlases—or perhaps for an imported beer—after it put up a billboard there recently. The ad, for Busch beer, featured a photograph of the Okefenokee Refuge, a famous national wildlife area in the Southeast, along with the headline: "Busch beer and the Okefenokee. Two Florida greats." Trouble is, 95 percent of the Okefenokee is in Georgia, with only a sliver of it in Florida. Oops.

Rather than head for the mountains, A-B rep Mary Alice Ramirez addressed the media. "The billboard mentioning the Okefenokee Refuge is incorrect," she admitted. "Anheuser-Busch apologizes for any confusion or concern its placement may have caused."

The ad, which went up on a billboard on I-95 just south of downtown Jacksonville, has since come down. It was part of a series of ads that were developed in conjunction with a contest inviting consumers to photograph various regions of the country.