Consumers Will Stay at Home for Super Bowl
Most US households will be watching the Super Bowl at home this year, according to new research from The Nielsen Company.
Most Households Will Spend Same or Less
Eighty-six percent of US households plan to spend the same or less on food and beverages for the Super Bowl this year as they did last year. Only 5% expect to spend more. The remaining 9% don’t know.
Beer is Opportunity for Grocers
The Super Bowl is only the seventh-largest beer-drinking occasion in the US. During the two weeks leading up to the Super Bowl, 49.2 million cases of beer are sold. In contrast, during the two weeks leading up to the number one beer-drinking occasion July Fourth, 63.5 million cases of beer are sold.
However, out of those 49.2 million cases of beer, 17 million, or 34.5%, are sold at grocery stores, with consumers already shopping for snacks and soda picking up some beer, as well.
Potato Chips Score Big
Nearly 166 million pounds of snacks were sold for a total of $644.7 million in the two weeks leading up to last year’s Super Bowl on February 7, 2009. This was a 3.3% drop from the equivalized unit volume of snacks sold in 2008.
Potato chips, the leading snack by dollar sales and equivalized unit volume (EQ), accounted for $173.8 million of sales and 44.3 million pounds of EQ. This means potato chips represented 26.9% of total snack dollars spent and 26.6% of total EQ consumed. Potato chip EQ rose 1.2% between 2008 and 2009.
Private Label Gains Ground
During the two weeks surrounding the Super Bowl in 2007, private label snacks held a dollar share of 6.8% and an EQ share of 10.4%. During the two weeks surrounding the Super Bowl in 2009, this jumped to a dollar share of 8.1% and an EQ of 12.5%. Nielsen says similar trends are evident for private label crackers, nuts and frozen pizza.
For Super Bowl Advertisers, the Earlier the Better
The upcoming Super Bowl holds the potential to be a “marketing bonanza” for television advertisers, according to other recent research from Nielsen. A slight majority of respondents, 51%, said they like the commercials more than the Super Bowl itself. Forty-nine percent of respondents would rather watch the football action.
However, Super Bowl advertisers looking to maximize audience response to their ads are advised to show them early in the game, preferably the first quarter. In terms of general recall, 69% of viewers remember ads aired during the first quarter. This percentage drops to 67% in the second quarter, 65% in the third quarter, and 58% in the fourth quarter. Brand linkage and likeability ratings show a similar decline as the game progresses.
Considering the heavy volume of beer sales, it is not surprising that during the last five years, the biggest Super Bowl advertiser is Anheuser-Busch, which spent more than $100 million on its Bud and Bud Light brands alone. Motion pictures form the biggest category of ad spending.
About the survey Nielsen surveyed more than 28,000 US households to obtain these figures.