A Super Bowl for Everybody

This Sunday, in case you haven’t already heard from the seemingly 24-hour coverage, is Super Bowl Sunday. It is the one ‘holiday’ where everyone can take part and enjoy. The football fans have their excitement coming from the game, of course, but the regular TV viewer is still excited for the alternative sources of entertainment. Sometimes it’s the halftime show, but typically it’s the time for commercials to take centre stage and wow us all. At a cost of $3 Million(!) for a 30-second spot, according to Reuters, the marketing geniuses branding their companies during the game have a lot to live up to. Every year, football fans and non-football fans alike can freely talk about which commercial they found to be the most memorable. Sometimes, it’s shameless over-sexualization of women that the male viewers won’t forget (or upset women). Other times, the commercials tug at our heartstrings when “Mean” Joe Green turns out to be not such a mean guy after all. One thing for sure is that at Super Bowl XLV the three B’s will be present: babes, beer, and beatings.

Scantily clad women seem to be common place in football. During the Super Bowl, however, sometimes the Dallas Cowboy cheerleaders just aren’t enough. And when Janet Jackson with her poorly designed wardrobe is not present, it’s up to commercials to push the boundaries of censorship on television. Enter GoDaddy, a website that does, well, we don’t know as we're so distracted by the women. The commercial really brands the website as opposed to explain what GoDaddy actually offers. And since the original commercial in 2005, it seems that there’s always the annual “what will they do this time?” with GoDaddy.

Beer is synonymous with sports, which explains why men are willing to pay more than $10 for a light beer at the stadium. To make themselves the choice beer for football fans, beer companies are consistently trying to show how their brand is the football beer. Typically, only heavyweights like Budweiser can afford such expensive commercials and they tailor their commercials to the football crowd. Their mascots, the Clydesdale horse are effective in portraying the strong personality with football toughness, as seen in their famous advert for the Extra Point.

But what gets football fans more riled up than football based commercials during a football game. And there’s no bigger part of football than monster hits. Last year, Betty White helped out her sudden career resurgence using a Snickers commercial of her playing amongst grown men and getting tackled hard. The advert was an instant hit. But no hit could be bigger than that of “Terrible” Terry Tate.

Terry Tate, Office Linebacker, was the creation of Reebok as a man who could improve workplace productivity through sheer intimidation. His brutal hits on co-workers left an impression making Terry Tate a brand in himself since his debut. He has several commercials that were featured exclusively online, and his notable sayings have been quoted across many parties in North America.

So the moral of the story is simple for advertisers everywhere. If your commercial doesn’t have any women in it, it better well have someone being beaten up in those 30 seconds. Otherwise, the whole thing will be a forgotten $3 million dollars of air time 30 seconds later.

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