by Nick Coston
This coming February 8th is the “Big Game”. Seattle Seahawks vs. New England Patriots, from San Francisco. Kickoff at 6:30pm EST. In 1981, when I watched the big game in a girlfriend’s basement on Chicago’s Far South Side, it was her dad’s man cave, the big game started at 3:00pm. Gina’s dads name was Fred. He also had season tickets behind the White Sox dugout at then Comiskey Park. Fred picked up some pizzas from an awesome joint called Milano’s on Western Avenue and yes, it’s still there.
That was number XV which decided the champion for the 1980 NFL season.
Back in the stone ages, the cost of a 30-second television spot was around a whopping $300,000. For those keeping score, the then Oakland Raiders beat the Philadelphia Eagles 27 to 10.
The brands haven’t changed too much since that year, Coca-Cola, Miller Lite, Chrysler, Budweiser, Stroh’s Beer and McDonalds. Beverages, beer, automotive. The halftime entertainment that year was titled “A Mardi Gras Festival” and starred the Southern University Marching Band along with singer Helen O’Connell performing The National Anthem along with singers Aaron Neville and Dr. John. After all, it was in New Orleans.
Jumping forward to 2026, the current cost for a 30 second spot during LX (60) now hovers close to $8M smackers. This year’s advertisers shockingly include Budweiser, Pepsi, Pringles, Hellman’s, Instacart and Meta among others. Beer, snacks, and mayonnaise. Yum.
Which brings us OOH industry peeps right back to our yearly question: what could you do with the money saved from NOT running a 30 second spot during the Big Game and what could a brand get for that pile of moola if they placed that $8M solely into OOH. Again, we’re only talking one spot here.
$8M would get you roughly a 500 GRP (gross rating point) that would deliver total impressions equal to 500% of the local market population for about 24 weeks in any of the top 5 big city markets. This level of buy exposes the same message five or more times to each audience, using direct, traditional OOH/DOOH buys.
Or you could press the easy button and drop $8M on a DOOH programmatic buy for six straight months, no interruptions, changing copy and brands often for six whopping months, covering the entire NFL schedule, starting with the pre-season games through to the Big Game Sunday. With that buy, you’d get 10,000 screens that appear in bars, getting the same impressions as that one 30 second spot. That’s a lot of screen time.
Factor in some slick negotiations, maybe you could cut this deal for $7M and use the extra $1M for some high profile, extra-large, jumbo-heavy billboards in the top five U.S. markets. Printing is extra.
Or just bag the whole spot and for $8M buy a small billboard plant, throwing in a small digital place-based network and have at it. 30 seconds vs a lifetime of OOH/DOOH faces?
As the old commercial goes, you make the call.
Insider’s Note: Nick Coston has been writing opinion pieces for the OOH industry for 10 years now. His weekly pieces also appear on Substack where you can view the last 2 years worth. Full-time, Nick is the VP, Sales and Sales Strategies for Moving Walls, the Singapore based media and ad tech giant, here in The America’s.
If you are interested, here is Nick’s Substack LINK
One more thing….. GO SEAHAWKS!
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