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Anheuser-Busch has been the Super Bowl’s sole alcohol advertiser for more than three decades, locking up category exclusivity for each game since 1989—until now.
Today, the company behind Budweiser, Bud Light and Michelob Ultra announced it will not renew its exclusivity deal for Super Bowl 57, which Fox will broadcast on Feb. 12, 2023.
The NFL does not plan to sign a new exclusivity deal with a rival alcohol brand. No other agreement of this sort exists within any other advertiser category for the Super Bowl.
While Anheuser-Busch still plans to run ads in the Big Game, its decision gives competitors such as Heineken and Molson Coors the option to run a national commercial in the Super Bowl for the first time since the ’80s. Diageo, the National Football League’s official spirits sponsor, also has an opportunity to purchase a slot.
Spencer Gordon, Anheuser-Busch’s vp of consumer connections, explained the shift in strategy allows the company to better deploy its marketing spend throughout the year, both during the football season and the summer months when consumers buy more of its beverages.
“The Super Bowl is a huge tentpole moment for consumers, but it doesn’t necessarily line up with the key moment of consumption for the beer industry,” said Gordon, who oversees media, sponsorships and draftLine, the company’s internal creative agency. “We are evolving our investments so that our brands reach the right consumers, at the right time, in the right place, with the right messages.”
Gordon added that with today’s plethora of screens and platforms, the notion of Super Bowl advertising exclusivity isn’t as vital as it was in 1989.
Despite increased audience fragmentation, the Super Bowl remains the most-watched TV program in the U.S. each year. In February, 112.3 million people tuned in for the 2022 Super Bowl, which aired on Feb. 13 across NBC, Telemundo, Peacock, NBC Sports Digital, NFL Digital platforms and Yahoo Sports. Although the audience was 16% larger than the 2021 Super Bowl, is was smaller than the 2015 telecast, which attracted 114.4 million viewers on linear alone.
Gordon noted that an increasingly fragmented media environment isn’t by definition a bad situation. “The beauty of mobile devices and digital media is that consumers are now able to spend even more time with the things they love,” he said. “We need to show up everywhere.”
The NFL completed a new broadcast rights deal for all its TV packages last year. Most networks extended their current NFL deals through the 2033 season, and ABC rejoined the Super Bowl rotation alongside NBC, CBS and Fox, broadcasting the game every four years.
Still committed to the game
Gordon stressed that while Anheuser-Busch is giving up its exclusive rights to Super Bowl alcohol advertising, it remains committed to the NFL and still intends to buy Super Bowl 57 ads.
In December 2021, Anheuser-Busch agreed to a multi-year extension as the league’s official beer and hard seltzer sponsor. More recently, the company announced Bud Light will have a presence at all major NFL events this offseason. The beer brand, for example, was the official sponsor of the 2022 NFL Draft, which took place in Las Vegas in April.
“We’re super involved with a lot of different media and sponsorships and experiential activations, but none is bigger than our relationship with the NFL,” said Gordon.
In addition to maintaining its financial commitments and partnerships with the NFL, Anheuser-Busch is planning to continue reinvesting the dollars it would have spent on a new exclusivity deal with the NFL’s Super Bowl broadcast partners.
Anheuser-Busch declined to disclose how much its prior exclusivity agreements cost.
“Are we spending the same amount of money with CBS and NBC and Fox? The answer is ‘yes,’” said Gordon. “But it’s on different moments throughout the year when we have inventory.”
According to Gordon, a lot if not all of the ad spend will go to NFL properties. Those conversations with the networks are currently ongoing as part of upfront negotiations.
A new era for Super Bowl brands
Anheuser-Busch’s announcement to relinquish its exclusivity deal comes a few weeks after Pepsi said it would no longer sponsor the Super Bowl Halftime Show following a decade-long partnership. In a statement, Pepsi explained its decision to walk away sprung from a “larger strategic shift to bring unprecedented music and entertainment experiences” to consumers “where they are now, and where they will be in the future.”
Like Anheuser-Busch, Pepsi will continue to invest in the NFL as the league’s official soft drink with marketing across TV, digital and retail and partnerships with both teams and players.
In February’s Super Bowl 56, Anheuser-Busch purchased four minutes of national airtime to spotlight six brands: Budweiser, Michelob Ultra, Bud Light Next, Cutwater Spirits, Michelob Ultra Organic Seltzer and Bud Light Seltzer Hard Soda. NBCUniversal received up to $7 million per 30-second spot during the broadcast.
Fox began selling ad inventory for the 2023 Super Bowl in September 2021, and will be looking to top NBCU’s Super Bowl 56 revenue haul.
While Fox Sports declined to comment on Anheuser-Busch’s decision and how it might affect the company’s Super Bowl ad sales plans, ad sales chief Marianne Gambelli told Adweek last month that live sports has “never been more in demand.”
“We continue to see clients shift budgets to Fox for our premium sports content. We have the biggest events on the sports calendar, including the FIFA World Cup and Super Bowl 57 and couldn’t be more excited about our historic year ahead,” Gambelli said. “Premium sports content attracts large audiences and delivers unrivaled scale for advertisers and nothing is bigger than the Super Bowl for building brands, and there’s always an incredibly strong demand.”
Adweek’s Jason Notte contributed to this story.
