Ad People Watching A Different Game

Michael Hedges January 27, 2021 Follow on Twitter

For more than a generation the advertising tribe has gathered annually to receive the message. These are the folks who design most of the messages defining the rest of us. They meet not quietly in dimly lit rooms, rather in personal spaces with like-minded members circling tables of beverages and food. At one moment, all attention on a giant screen, the tribe is silent. It’s the first ad break of the Super Bowl.

The Super Bowl is the grand finale of the American pro-football season. This year it hits the airwaves Sunday evening February 7th. While American football has never migrated beyond North America, American advertising has. The coronavirus pandemic and resulting economic malaise has upended sports, sports broadcasting and the ad business. US viewership for Super Bowl LV (55), broadcast in the US on the CBS network, is widely expected to be below the 100 million tuning in previously. The ad people like real-time feedback on their creations from a giant audience, available within seconds from Nielsen. Top ad-score ratings during the Super Bowl preview top Cannes Lions awards, which mean everything for bonuses in ad land.

Because everything is now different, so too is the Super Bowl. Budweiser ads, iconic for creative brilliance, not to forget the Clydesdale horses, will not appear. Budweiser ads have appeared in the Super Bowl telecast for the past 37 years. "Some people might wonder why we're not showing up at the Super Bowl, but we will just show up in a different way,” said VP/Marketing Monica Rustgi to CNN Business (January 25). They are "reallocating the media investment” to Ad Council placements about coronavirus vaccines.

CBS TV set a US$5.6 million price for 30 second ads, noted AdAge (January 25), pale compared to the creative costs. Ads for the Bud Light and Michelob Ultra brands will, however, appear during the football game telecast. Bud Light is the biggest selling beer brand in the US. Coca-Cola, Hyundai and Avocados of Mexico had already announced they would forego Super Bowl ads this year. Pepsi is moving its “investment” to the ever-popular half-time show.

There was a Budweiser ad “ready to go,” said Ms Rustgi, quoted by Variety (January 25), without revealing anything else. “Anything is possible, but the plan right now is we are going to be back next year.” A-B InBev spent US$80.2 million on TV sports in 2020, down from US$140.5 million in the previous year.

Advertising people - and the brands they tout - are facing multiple challenges all converging. Of course, the coronavirus pandemic has decimated foot traffic; bars, restaurants and much of retail closed, sports and entertainment venues restricted. Media usage changed; more home time. But media usage was changing already; traditional media falling to social and online media. Much of that is aligned with demographic changes in many countries. Gen Z sports fans check out abbreviated game results on Tik-Tok.

All of these contribute to changes in public interest issues. Public health is clearly high on that list but so are climate change, inequality and racism. Unilever’s Ben and Jerry’s ice cream, long noted as an activist brand, recently added a flavor honoring Colin Kaepernick, the former US football quarterback shunned by the National Football League (NFL) for his stance against racism. Ben & Jerry’s participated in the Facebook boycott last summer. Influential US ad agency Wieden+Kennedy announced it only wants staff and clients who believe Black Lives Matter, noted Ad Week (June 17, 2020).

Australian creative agencies AKQA and Jung van Matt challenged climate disbelief by releasing a 30 minute video: The (Uncertain) Four Seasons. Rather than visualizing the serenity of Vivaldi’s masterpiece, the AI-adapted visuals and new score, performed by the Sydney Symphony Orchestra, depict the range - and ravage - of climate change. The animations “move at an imperceptible speed sometimes and are changed before you realize,” AKQA Australia executive creative director Tim Devine to Muse (January 14). "We loved this parallel with climate change."

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