Dive Brief:
- Beer was the leading product category by sales dollars at $583 million in sales for the week leading up to last year's Super Bowl, according to IRI.
- By units, salty snacks won out with more than 196 million units sold, which equates to about $438 million in sales.
- In terms of biggest sales boost, dips and spreads triumphed with 48% and 13% increased sales respectively in that week. Sales for both totaled $54.8 million last year.
Dive Insight:
Light beer brands, which have suffered a gradual decline over the past several years with the rise of imports and craft beer, will undoubtedly benefit from the Super Bowl sales boost for beer. Anheuser-Busch InBev extended its Bud Light sponsorship of the NFL for another six years in November, and in total, AB InBev bought three minutes of Super Bowl ads, including time for Bud Light.
Whether light beer can create "staying power" with Super Bowl marketing this year will determine if these brands have best utilized all channels of communication with consumers in the week leading up to and during the game to build momentum that can last for weeks after.
A recent study shows that the week of the Super Bowl and week before the Super Bowl are the two weeks of the year with the highest calorie consumption for consumers, which corroborates the skyrocketing sales of beer and salty snacks reported last year. Consumers may be more concerned about eating healthy, but manufacturers don't have much to worry about come Super Bowl week as those New Year's resolutions and dietary changes are an afterthought.
That said, snack producers thrive come Super Bowl week as consumers look for quick eats during the game. But one way to compromise between consumers' conflicting dietary choices is for manufacturers to produce more varieties of snacks consumers deem healthy, such as popcorn and meat snacks.