Corona Extra is a pale lager produced by Mexican brewery Cervecería Modelo and owned by Belgian company AB InBev. It is commonly served with a wedge of lime or lemon in the neck of the bottle to add tartness and flavour. It is one of the top-selling beers worldwide, and Corona Extra has been the top-selling imported drink in the U.S. since 1998.
Corona beer is available in a variety of bottled presentations, ranging from the ampolleta up to the Corona Familiar. A draught version also exists, as does canned Corona in some markets. In Spain, the beer is branded as Coronita, as renowned winemaker Bodegas Torres has owned the trademark for "Coronas" since 1907. The packaging is otherwise unchanged. In the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, and the US, smaller, 210ml bottles of the beer are also branded as "Coronita".
As of February 2020, after the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, Corona suffered a $170 million loss in earnings in the virus' origin country of China. The company attributed the sales drop to fewer people going out in public, with many bars and restaurants being forced to close down. Multiple brands of beer experienced relative sales slumps in the country, as the spread of COVID-19 had generally dampened public activities. Sales were typically high over the period due to Chinese New Year celebrations. However, Constellation Brands reported a 5% increase in sales of Corona Extra in the U.S. in the four weeks ending February 16, though the company's new hard seltzer had to stop promotion because its ads were perceived as being in "poor taste". CNN reported that a survey by 5W Public Relations said that 38% of Americans would not buy Corona "under any circumstances" because of the outbreak, and another 14% said they would not order a Corona in public. The survey of 737 American beer drinkers over the age of 21 was conducted via phone on February 25 and 26, 2020. The PR firm's news release said the survey was done "regarding their opinions about the popular Mexican beer brand, Corona, as a result of the deadly COVID-19 coronavirus that's spreading around the world". The company did not publish detailed methodological data. The question responsible for the 38% statistic did not explicitly mention COVID-19 as a motivation, which might have instead simply indicated a preference for a different brand of beer. Among regular Corona drinkers, only 4% said they planned to stop drinking the brand. Grupo Modelo announced on Twitter that it would stop producing Corona beer during a shutdown of non-essential businesses lasting from March 30 to April 30 by the Mexican government due to COVID-19.