E-Malt.com News article: 4504

USA: Anheuser-Busch Cos. Inc. spent more than US$293 million on sports advertising, ranking it first among the top 100 sports advertisers in 2004, St. Louis Business Journal posted on March 21. The Sports Business Journal, reported that the St. Louis-based brewer spent 83% of its US$352.2 million total ad spending last year on sports, up 34.5 % from its 2003 sports ad spending. The report attributed the increase to Olympics-related advertising. The company ranked No. 1 in 2003, as well.

Rival Miller Brewing Co. of Milwaukee spent US$131.8 million on sports advertising, or nearly 69 % of its US$191.2 million ad total, ranking it No. 7 in 2004, down from No. 4 in 2003. Golden, Colo.-based Coors Brewing Co. spend US$82.25 million, or 26 % of its US$106.8 million total spending, ranking it No. 15, down from No. 6 in 2003.

Ranking No. 2 in 2004 was General Motors Corp.'s Chevrolet division, which spent $220 million of its $370.2 million ad budget on sports advertising. Cingular Wireless had the largest increase in its sports ad spending in 2004, spending $164.5 million, up 243.6 percent from 2003. SBC Communications, Gillette USA, Allstate Insurance Co. and Coca-Cola USA also stepped up their sports ad spending by more than 100 percent. Companies with the most ad spending devoted to sports were the NCAA (100 percent), Acushnet Co. (100 percent), Southwest Airlines (98.6 percent), NASCAR (98.5 percent), and PGA Tour Inc., (96.5 percent). McDonald's Corp. spent nearly 95 percent of its ad spending on sports, or $101 million. The Sports Business Journal used data from Nielsen Monitor-Plus.


23 March, 2005