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As we creep closer and closer to the championship of all football championships, we’re not just thinking about the football aspect of the big game. We’re also thinking about the most hyped-up commercials we’ll see all year.
The money spent on the game is outrageous. Last year, it cost Atlanta $46 million to host the Super Bowl, an average $4.3K for a ticket to the game, about $14.8 million total spent around the country for Super Bowl parties, over $1.3 billion on beer sales, and, of course, the unprecedented amount spent on advertising. If last year is any indication, in order to run a 30-second commercial during the Super Bowl, companies must spend $5.25 million.
If companies are spending almost $175,000 per second, we have to wonder whether the advertisement is worth the spend. Numbers don’t lie, but neither do the 100 million-plus viewers whose eyes will be glued to your company for those 30 glorious seconds. Undoubtedly, both household-name and up-and-coming brands will be making the most of their dollars and bringing their A-game ads on Feb. 2nd.
While the Super Bowl kicks off the start of a new year, each year comes with a new set of happenings, findings and challenges that are capturing the world’s attention, which, in turn, shapes how advertisers captivate their audience and spread a message. Here are some trends we expect to see in the Super Bowl advertisements in 2020:
Gender Equality
In the past year, women have been challenging societal structures as old as time in which men have the upper hand. We’ve seen the #MeToo and #TimesUp movements take off, a record number of women running for government positions, the U.S. Soccer Women’s National Team lead a fight for equal pay after they won the World Cup for the second time in a row, the Women’s March being held in locations all over the world, and so much more.
Many women — and, yes, some men too — are very passionate about achieving gender equality, and I believe we’ll definitely see that theme popping up in 2020 Super Bowl commercials.
Global Warming/Climate Change
Between the wildfires in California and now Australia, and Hurricane Dorian and the many typhoons, cyclones and tropical storms, the world is experiencing a record number of billion-dollar disasters right now. The climate crisis is being pushed to the forefront of our discussions, and most American parents want their kids to learn about climate change in the classroom.
Many people are tuning in to how they can play a part in improving our environment, which usually starts with being a smarter consumer and reducing our own personal waste, so expect brands to tap into that environmental consciousness when they’re creating their ads.
Politics
We’re coming up on a very important election year, and right now the race is on for the Democrats to choose their best candidate to go up against Donald Trump in the next presidential election (provided the Senate doesn’t remove him from office, which is unlikely; plus, the word is he’s already running a Super Bowl ad of his own).
Besides the two above trends also standing as some of the most talked-about political issues, we’ve seen gun control (mass killings and, more specifically, shootings at an all-time high in the U.S.), economic inequality (minimum wage and basic income), foreign policy (turmoil in Afghanistan and Iran and trade deals), education (free college and student debt), immigration (the U.S.-Mexico border and abolishing ICE), democratic structure (dissolving the electoral college and making D.C. a state) and health care (Medicare-for-all and prescription drug prices) issues come to the forefront over the past year. People in the U.S. tend to have very strong opinions on these issues, and political advertisers will likely play off of viewers’ emotions.
Health and Wellness
The wellness industry has been growing nearly twice as fast as the global economic growth rate over the past few years, making it a $4.5 trillion industry in 2018. We’ve seen boutique fitness studios like SoulCycle and Barry’s Bootcamp, athleisure brands such as lululemon and Outdoor Voices, sustainable beauty and fashion companies, corporate wellness initiatives, mental health and meditation practices, and cannabis and CBD brands blow up over the past year. Yes, wellness is an industry of its own, but it crosses over into so many other industries — even real estate — that we’re almost guaranteed to see one of our favorite products being advertised under the shade of some form of health and wellness.
Beer
Who could forget beer? There are always a few beer commercials that’ll either warm our hearts and make us cry, or make us laugh so hard that we cry. We can’t help but wonder what beer commercial this year will top last year’s cute puppy and the team of Clydesdales from Budweiser, or the medieval quest filled with backhanded jabs at other beer brands that actually use corn syrup from Bud Light.
No matter your stance on whether the commercials are worth the price tag or not, advertisers make sure they’re stretching their ad dollars during the Super Bowl to make the most out of their spends.
With the amount of time and money marketers are putting into the ads, they’ll make sure that we’re fully invested in that 30-second span of time and we leave with a message and call to action. Within those 30-second stints, we’re guaranteed to see these trends pop up multiple times and make us think about what we’re consuming, as well as bigger societal issues and the role we play in those issues — because that’s what great ads do.
