By Luke Armstrong of Coburg Consultants

This Sunday about 100 million people will tune in to watch the Super Bowl, myself included. It’s no secret that the big game means big business, but just how much money changes hands might surprise you.

Total consumer spending for this year’s Super Bowl is estimated to hit ten BILLION dollars. That’s nearly as much as was spent on Black Friday this year (about $14 billion) and about five times more than Cyber Monday (about $1.7 billion).

The Super Bowl is also about 0.06% of the US GDP – pretty impressive for a football game.

Many tickets are not actually sold to the general public. The tickets that are sold to “Average Joes”, however, often make their way to secondary markets as demand drives the prices up. You can still score tickets on StubHub for the nosebleeds in MetLife Stadium at a price of $1,637 per seat. If you’d rather relax in a lower bowl suite, it’ll cost you $686,720. Parking runs from $180 to $3,300.

You can’t watch the Super Bowl at home without a cold drink and a nice spread of snacks. About 49 million cases of beer were purchased for last year’s Super Bowl, which works out to almost two beers each for every American man, woman, and child.

And don’t forget the chicken wings, a staple of Super Bowl parties across the continent. The US National Chicken Council expects Americans to slurp 1.25 billion chicken wings this year, up 4% over last year. Consumption is expected to increase because wings are relatively cheaper this year. The drought of Summer 2012 caused corn prices to rise, which in turn increased feed costs and chicken prices for early 2013.

I’m not a gambling man, but many are. Last year, $98.9 million was wagered legally in Las Vegas casinos. Mint estimates that total gambling (including illegal wagers) on the Lombardi trophy could be more than $8 billion. You can bet on pretty much anything, including the colour of the winning team’s Gatorade bath, the length of the national anthem, and whether the Red Hot Chili Peppers will be wearing shirts.

Of course, you can’t talk about the business of the Super Bowl without talking advertising. Companies spend huge dollars on ad development and planning even before the airtime purchase, which is averaging $3.75 million per 30-second spot.

But Super Bowl ads are more than just a TV spot – they’ve become a bona fide cultural phenomenon. Companies now release Super Bowl ad trailers, like this one from Volkswagen. Some proposition a choose-your-own adventure for consumers, such as H&M’s ad featuring David Beckham.

Is broadcast advertising dead or do these ads confirm it is alive and well? Can you even count today’s Super Bowl ads as broadcast media or are they fully-integrated interactive consumer communication? These are some of the discussions we’re having in class this week at the Dalhousie CRMBA.

Enjoy the game!