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While several of the biggest traditional Super Bowl advertisers might be sitting out this year’s Big Game, that hasn’t put a dent in CBS’ advertising sales for Super Bowl 55.
The Feb. 7 game—which will feature the Kansas City Chiefs taking on the Tampa Bay Buccaneers—is “virtually sold out,” according to a ViacomCBS spokesperson. This is consistent with how CBS has announced Super Bowl sellouts in the past: While there technically isn’t any remaining in-game inventory, the company will still try to find a way to accommodate any marketers who make a great offer at the last minute.
While in-game airtime is sold out, CBS still has pre-game and post-game spots available for advertisers who still want to be involved in Super Bowl Sunday.
CBS sold ads for as much as $5.5 million per 30-second spot, which is slightly below last year’s $5.6 million rate, but the network’s deals also require marketers to pay an additional $300,000 per spot to be included in the digital livestream.
When CBS last broadcast the Super Bowl two years ago, the network did not announce that it had sold out of inventory until less than five hours before the game began.
But for last year’s game, Super Bowl 54, Fox sold out of its in-game inventory 10 weeks early, for the fastest market in nine years.
As Adweek reported last fall, this year’s late-moving upfront and NFL markets—due to the pandemic—slowed Super Bowl talks. But negotiations “accelerated” in August, Jo Ann Ross, president and chief advertising revenue officer of domestic advertising sales at ViacomCBS, told Adweek in September, and momentum has continued since then.
While Budweiser and Coke are sitting this year out—and Pepsi won’t run in-game ads but will continue to sponsor the Super Bowl Halftime Show—several other brands have confirmed that they will appear, including first-time ads from Huggies, Chipotle and DoorDash.
Super Bowl advertisers have also been struggling to capture the right tone during the pandemic.
For all the latest Super Bowl advertising news—who’s in, who’s out, teasers, full ads and more—check out Adweek’s Super Bowl 2021 Ad Tracker and the rest of our stories about the Big Game. And join us on the evening of Feb. 7 for the best in-game coverage of the commercials anywhere.
