The Super Bowl is advertising’s favorite holiday. At $7 million for a 30-second spot, it’s also its most expensive opportunity.
Whether it’s the glitz and glam of celebrity and influencer appearances, a repetitious messaging strategy (we’re looking at you, Temu) or trying to force a viral moment, the pressure is on advertisers to stand out from the competition.
With that added pressure, brand values like prioritizing sustainability may fall by the wayside, especially when there’s been such little progress made cutting emissions in general.
But without industrywide standards for sustainability, it’s difficult to implement change, particularly during major advertising events that produce more emissions than an average day of media consumption.
Last year, digital ad impressions during the Super Bowl alone were responsible for 13,860 metric tons of CO2, according to estimates by Sprout Social, which is the equivalent of burning 1.5 million gallons of gas.
But most of the focus this year was on higher-profile efforts to cut emissions. For example, Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas, which hosted the Big Game, claims to have powered Super Bowl LVIII entirely using solar renewable energy generated by a nearby farm.
It remains an open question, however, as to whether this was actually a “green” Super Bowl considering the number of private jets that flew to Las Vegas for the game. (Taylor Swift wasn’t alone. A whopping 882 private planes jetted to Vegas last weekend.)
So we asked the experts: How much did advertisers, broadly speaking, consider the carbon footprint of their digital advertising during the Super Bowl this year, and how could that change in the future?
- Céline Craipeau, VP of sustainability, Jellyfish
- Frank Maguire, VP of insights, strategy and sustainability, Sharethrough
- David Shaw, co-founder and CEO, Cedara
Céline Craipeau, VP of sustainability, Jellyfish
Although there is real momentum, most marketers still lack the technical tools and the understanding to embed carbon reduction in their media strategy, even when the business stakes are as high as they get during the Super Bowl.
Planning a campaign over multiple KPIs and effectively optimizing against them is quite a challenge. Every brand must build its own learning curve with the support of their media partners to do that effectively and, unfortunately, most are not ready to roll this out at such an insane scale. Most people attempting to tackle the challenge are just starting the testing phase.
Don’t get me wrong: I am not saying we should take it slow. Climate action is critical and urgent, so we need to accelerate the transformation of this industry. But we also need to take all the necessary steps toward success.
Frank Maguire, VP of insights, strategy and sustainability, Sharethrough
Since most brands don’t speak publicly about their advertising sustainability initiatives, it’s difficult to know exactly how much advertisers considered their carbon footprint during the Super Bowl. However, looking at our own data, we did see some interesting trends.
For example, although it’s worth noting we didn’t see a significant week-over-week increase in spend, there was a nearly 300% increase in spend through our Green Media Products this year during the week leading up to the Super Bowl versus the same week in 2023.
Looking ahead, we expect the trend of Super Bowl advertisers taking action to lower their carbon emissions to continue, especially as we’ve seen the NFL launch [its environmental program] NFL Green.
David Shaw, co-founder and CEO, Cedara
The Super Bowl generated more digital activity this year, which likely resulted in a higher carbon footprint for digital advertising associated with this tentpole event.
We’ve seen brands extend their linear TV campaigns to second screens, influencers on social, gaming and digital out-of-home placements. The shifting of viewership for the Super Bowl from linear to CTV also means that more ads are running on the highest carbon footprint format and device in digital.
Even so, it’s difficult to quantify the relative carbon impact from digital advertising tied to this year’s Super Bowl because most advertisers still don’t measure or optimize for lower emissions.
Hopefully, both will become more prevalent during the next Super Bowl with the introduction of industry standard measurement frameworks from GARM and Ad Net Zero later this year.
Answers have been lightly edited and condensed.
