20th Century Fox and AT&T Were Among Last Week’s Biggest Spenders on New TV Ads

Have you been seeing a lot of Mark Wahlberg lately? And maybe a fair share of Sprint's spot featuring a human and dog look-alike, too? Sprint and AT&T were among the top five spenders on broadcast placement for new creative for the last week of April. Combined, the two companies spent nearly $17 million on new campaigns, according to figures from Kantar Media. As a whole, advertisers spent a little over $887 million on broadcast placement for the week of April 24, up from $871 million the week prior, with around 10 percent of that earmarked for new creative. For the top five spenders, new creative represented 43 percent of the $39.5 million spent on broadcast placement. For the third consecutive week, the NBA Playoffs took in more money spent on new creative than any other programming, as advertisers spent some $6 million on broadcast placement during games as the NBA Playoffs reached the conclusion of its first round. Other top programs for new creative included The Voice and American Housewife. [kickout id="6"] The top national advertiser for new creative last week was 20th Century Fox Pictures, which spent 40 percent (roughly $3.8 million) of its total spend of over $9.5 million on placement for new ads. With Mother's Day on the horizon, over $3.3 million of that went to a new trailer promoting Snatch, a mother/daughter comedy starring Amy Schumer and Goldie Hawn which debuts on May 12. The studio began promoting the movie back in March and has spent a total of $9.7 million on national broadcast placement, and $4 million just last week (including previously released trailers). The studio also spent a comparatively small $459,000 on placement for new creative promoting Alien: Covenant, with The Voice being the top program for its new creative placement for both movies at $201,000 for each. [kickout id="1"] Of the top five spenders on new creative, AT&T actually had the largest total budget for broadcast placement at over $11.8 million. The network spent $3.6 million of that, 31 percent of its total broadcast budget, on placement for BBDO's new "Terms and Conditions" campaign starring Mark Wahlberg. At $637,00, the NBA Playoffs was the top programming for the effort. [kickout id="2"] Walt Disney Pictures spent a solid 82 percent of its approximate $4.3 million broadcast placement budget on new creative, with $297,000 of that spent on placement during the NBA Playoffs. Most of that went to promote Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, with the sequel receiving around $3.4 million of the just over $3.5 million it spent on placement for new creative. Interestingly, the top program for the movie's new trailer was not NBA Basketball but Fox's ratings giant Empire, which received $288,000 of the spend. [kickout id="3"] Sprint spent 40 percent of its total $7.8 million broadcast placement budget on new creative featuring human/canine lookalikes Topher and Rosenberg promoting its unlimited plan. Nearly $500,000 of that $3.1 million went to the NBA Playoffs. [kickout id="4"] You'd be excused for not recognizing (or forgetting that you'd seen) the advertiser rounding out the list of the top five spenders. Pharmaceutical company Takeda spent some $2.8 million on placement for a new ad promoting its Trintellix brand. That represented 47 percent of Takeda's total broadcast placement budget of just over $6 million. Unsurprisingly, the NBA Playoffs received more of the spend than any other programming, at $265,000. [kickout id="5"]