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Less than a week before the Big Game, Fox Sports announced this morning that it has sold all of its in-game Super Bowl 57 inventory.
That’s much closer to game day than the company had anticipated, due to an “atypical” series of events—including the “implosion” of one of last year’s biggest Super Bowl categories, said Mark Evans, evp of ad sales for Fox Sports.
The Feb. 12 game—which will see the Kansas City Chiefs take on the Philadelphia Eagles—sold out nearly two weeks ago, Evans told Adweek.
The sellout comes five months after the company first told Adweek it was “95% sold out,” but then provided no further updates for four months.
Sources close to the negotiations said the company sold multiple 30-second units north of $7 million per spot by September, but some of those deals had been done several years ago.
“There were a few unique situations between 95% sell out and being sold out that were atypical, to say the least, and one of which is the implosion of the crypto category,” Evans said.
Typically, if a brand drops out of the Big Game, Fox would keep the revenue and re-express it across the entire portfolio, not necessarily just sports.
“Once you buy a Super Bowl unit, you own it. You can’t drop it or come out unless it’s extraordinary circumstances,” Evans said, explaining the long gap between ad sales updates.
The company sold additional spots over $7 million until the sellout. The majority of 30-second spots sold in the mid-to-high $6 million range.
Fox had units sold to a company that is “still around but doesn’t really exist anymore,” Evans said, referring to bankrupt cryptocurrency exchange FTX.
“That was a unique circumstance where there’s nothing we can do, and that created a few avails,” he added.
Several other clients needed to drop out of the game for “various reasons,” which also created additional inventory.
“It would be crazy not to recognize the slowdown in the economy where people were fearful of a recession and all the headwinds that would potentially come with that,” said Evans.
As clients begin to see the dailies from the creative shoots they want to make a :30, a :60 and in some cases even a :90. That’s what drove a lot of final units.
Mark Evans, Fox Sports ad sales evp
While in-game airtime is sold out, Fox still has “a couple” pre-game units left and one-and-a-half units left in the first national ad break following the game.
Last year, the most expensive spot NBCUniversal secured was $7 million. In 2020, CBS “virtually sold out” the Big Game 11 days before kickoff, selling ads for as much as $5.5 million per 30-second spot, well below Fox’s record numbers this year.
Bye bye crypto
In 2022, the cryptocurrency category exploded onto the scene and had a large presence in Super Bowl 56.
This year, Fox is seeing a wide representation of industries.
“It wasn’t one category driving this Super Bowl like crypto had in the past,” Evans said, adding that viewers can expect a broad spectrum of clients that typically buy into the game.
“We’ve had advertisers during this period look for sell-off,” said Evans, noting the practice of advertisers redistributing spots to others.
Other companies also asked for relief, which Fox granted once the network could replace the unit.
After companies backed out, the majority of replaced units came from brands that had already made buys and wanted to expand their creative.
“As clients begin to see the initial dailies from the creative shoots that they have from the concepts that they want to have, some love them, and they want to make a :30, a :60 and in some cases even a :90,” said Evans. “That’s what drove a lot of final units.”
The one category that Fox saw as more unique this year was the alcohol category after Anheuser-Busch gave up its 34-year run as the Super Bowl’s exclusive alcohol advertiser, a trend that had already been tracking in 2022.
This year’s Super Bowl advertisers include Google, Rémy Cointreau, Anheuser-Busch, Paramount+, Priceline, Netflix and General Motors, Uber, M&M’s, Molson Coors, Heineken, PepsiCo, Booking.com, FanDuel, Doritos, Pringles, Downy and Avocados from Mexico.
For the latest Super Bowl 57 advertising news—who’s in, who’s out, teasers, full ads and more—check out Adweek’s Super Bowl 2023 Ad Tracker and the rest of our stories here. And join us on the evening of Feb. 12 for the best in-game coverage of the commercials.
