Fox Sports officially sold out Super Bowl LVII inventory, selling its final in-game spot in the week before the NFL conference championship games. The network only has two spots left in its pre-kick show that runs right up until kickoff, and it currently is selling spots for an overtime that may not occur. Some one-time advertisers are paying more than $7M for a 30-second spot. Most are paying in the mid-$6M range. “It’s certainly far and away the most money that we’ve ever booked in a Super Bowl,” said Fox Sports EVP/Sales Mark Evans.
Evans cited three reasons this Super Bowl’s ad sales came slower than previous years, especially considering that Fox started the regular season with the Super Bowl 90% sold. First, there’s the collapse of FTX and other crypto companies, which had bought several spots early. FTX, in fact, had committed to a 60-second spot. This year’s game, though, will not feature any crypto companies. Crypto companies bought around five spots in last year’s game. Fox had sold several spots to crypto companies that had to back out. A few other unnamed advertisers had to back out on commitments because of supply chain issues that affected some of the products they had planned to advertise during the game. Finally, some companies were jittery about the economy. “While there was never any hysteria, we did have a handful of brands tell us that they planned on advertising but wanted to see one more earnings report or jobs report before they could commit,” Evans said.
As far as who will be advertising during the game, Evans said to expect familiar brands pitching their wares during the game. “You're going to see the telcos that you would expect and the salty snacks and the package goods and the autos that you expect,” he said. “All of the usual suspects are there.” Evans said that his group sold “a handful” of ads to first-time Super Bowl advertisers. One difference will come in the beer and spirits category. A-B gave up its exclusivity for the first time in nearly three decades. A-B still will have the most ads, but viewers will see multiple beer and spirit brands during the game. “You're going to see a lot more competition in that category than you've ever seen in the Super Bowl,” Evans said.
