Anheuser deal shows family firms fair game

By Eleanor Wason and Jessica Hall

LONDON/PHILADELPHIA (Reuters) - A $52 billion (26.2 billion pounds) takeover of U.S. brewer Anheuser-Busch Cos BUD.N by Brazilian-Belgian rival InBev INTB.BR demonstrates how tough 21st century business is for many family-run companies.

Despite Anheuser Chief Executive August Busch IV recently saying he wouldn't sell the company his family had run for five generations, a lacklustre share performance in recent years and a combined family stake of only four percent meant he had little defence against the famously efficient InBev.

"Family enterprises, even those with a long history, tend to do well only when business is localised ... where you don't have the kind of pressures from the outside that force it to make big decisions and take risks and grow," said Tom Pirko, president of Bevmark LLC, a California-based beverage industry consultancy.

"The family corporation or the family-founded business with a heritage is a phenomenon that is pretty much passing out," he added.

Anheuser is one of several historic food or drink companies still with strong links to founding families. Molson Coors Brewing Co (TAP.N) and Mars in the U.S., Femsa (FMSAUBD.MX) and Grupo Modelo (GMODELOC.MX) in Mexico and confectioners Ferrero and Haribo in Europe are also examples.

Others that have fallen to takeovers in recent years include gum maker Wrigley WWY.N, bought by Mars for $23 billion, and Grupo Empresarial Vavaria SA, sold by Colombia's Santo Domingo family to SABMiller (SAB.L).

In the U.S. in particular, the disappearance of another piece of corporate history also marks the dwindling influence of such industrialist families on local politics and philanthropy.

The Buschs in St Louis, Missouri, like the Wrigleys in Chicago, championed local causes and institutions.