MILWAUKEE – Anheuser-Busch is rolling out a $50 million advertising campaign for Bud Light playing up the beer’s “drinkability,” trying to set the brand apart as rival MillerCoors waits until the new year to release new ads for its big seller, Miller Lite.

Bud Light’s new ads, which start airing Saturday during college football, feature situations ranging from a football game to a pool party to tell consumers that all light beer isn’t the same and that Bud Light has taste but won’t fill them up.

“Light beer as a category has become a little bit more ubiquitous, and so differentiating yourself within the array of choices that exist for consumers, to me that’s going to win the game,” said Keith Levy, vice president of brand management.

The St. Louis-based brewer, which is selling itself to Belgian brewer InBev SA, said consumers told the brewer that Bud Light had enough flavor and is easy to swallow – two factors that help make it a beer that people can drink. The ads boast the tag line: “Bud Light, the difference is drinkability.” That replaces “Bud Light keeps it coming” and before that, “Make it a Bud Light.”

The ads use humor to position Bud Light against other light beers, a category that’s now considered the industry standard. But the ads don’t name competitors.

“When you’re the biggest brand in the world, it’s more valuable for you as a brand to talk about yourself versus somebody else,” Levy said.

In an ad featuring a pool party, one person says he doesn’t care which light beer he has because they all taste the same. Not so, says a man who appears as all the others in the background freeze.

“Does bath water taste the same as spring water?” he says, putting bird-bath water into a man’s cup.

“Does ground beef taste the same as beef on the ground?” he asks as beef falls from a hamburger flipper to the grass.

No, he says. Bud Light is different.

“It has just the right taste without being too heavy,” he said.