Advertisers Making Last-Minute Buys As USFL Opening Night Draws Near

Are you ready for some more pro football?

With the April 16 opening night of the revived United States Football League (USFL) just days away, after a slow sales start, a growing number of advertisers have jumped on board with assorted ad packages on broadcasters Fox and NBC and their sibling cable networks.

Following a similar ad sales pattern to the short-lived revival of the XFL in the spring of 2020, where advertisers started finalizing deals in the last few weeks and even days prior to the start of the season, advertisers have finally been signing off on packages for the USFL revival.

One difference is that Fox and NBC are apparently selling ad units at higher prices than the $20,000 per 30-second spot that XFL was initially receiving two years ago.

According to buyers, advertisers have been paying between $35,000 and $40,000 per 30-second commercial on each network for the Saturday and Sunday afternoon games on Fox and NBC and between $20,000 and $25,000 for ad units on Fox’s FS1 and NBC’s USA network.

Primetime Simulcast Opener

The season opening game will be a primetime simulcast game on Saturday night, April 16, between the New Jersey Generals and Birmingham Stallions, which will air on both Fox and NBC beginning at 7:30 p.m. ET.

It will be the first time that competing broadcast networks televised a professional sporting event simultaneously since the first Super Bowl in 1967, which was televised by both NBC and CBS.

Ad units for the opening night telecast on each network are selling for about $50,000 per :30, according to buyers.

Both Fox and NBC have declined to discuss ad sales specifics prior to Saturday night’s telecast.

But for advertisers who are buying into ad packages across the 43-game season, agency buyers say the networks have offered an average 2.0 household guarantees for each telecast. In terms of viewers, that is about 2.6 million viewers.

Hard Sell Tactics

While the bulk of the deals have been getting done over the past several weeks, both Fox and NBC have been quietly trying to sell advertisers and their agencies on the USFL dating back to early January, according to agency sources.

“NBC did not sell a single sports package the first few months of this year without trying to include USFL ads in it,” one buyer says. “And that includes golf. And Fox was pushing on advertisers also, perhaps more so than NBC.”

But both networks were also using USFL buys as leverage to grant advertisers better guarantees in the other sports telecasts, buyers say.

“When we were trying to buy a Super Bowl ad unit on NBC, the network said that as part of that deal we also had to commit to buying some ad time either in the Winter Olympics in February or in the USFL in April,” one media agency executive says. “And with Fox, if you wanted to buy advertising in any of their sports telecasts and get guarantees on those buys, you had to include some USFL ad buys.”

“Every sports package that Fox is sending over for us to look at and finalize has had some USFL units added on to it,” another buyer says.

Buyers Take it in Stride

However, that both Fox and NBC are aggressively pushing the agencies to make some USFL ad buys to get other inventory has not offended the agencies for a few reasons.

First, the live TV sports landscape is pretty tight as far as advertising availability goes. Buyers say the NBA playoffs are all but sold out, the Major League Baseball regular season is sold out, the first half of the NASCAR season on Fox is heavily sold, as are the NHL playoffs on ABC/ESPN and Turner.

“The USFL is another sport that advertisers are able to buy if they want to reach a live audience and the networks are not asking for huge prices for each ad unit,” one media buyer says. “When you are spending $300,000 to $600,000 for one ad unit in the NFL, $30,000 or so is not a lot to ask for a USFL unit, even if the viewership is only a tiny fraction of the NFL’s.”

“Live sports continue to be the most resistant to ratings erosion of anything on television right now, and our clients continue to look for more opportunities to buy live sports, so the USFL fits in for many of them,” says another buyer.

One agency exec with multiple clients who bought into the USFL says, “Live sports is the most resistant to ratings erosion of anything on television right now. So, our clients are looking for more opportunities to buy live sports.”

And yet another buyer says, “There is an appetite for spring football if it is done right. The XFL was curving in the right direction of success when the pandemic hit. Success for the USFL is a possibility.”

Who’s Buying Still A Mystery

The networks have not confirmed what advertisers have specifically done deals, and the media agencies, likewise, have not revealed the names of specific advertisers who have signed up for USFL ad deals.

If you tune in Saturday night, you’ll be able to see the lineup of advertisers who have bought into the new league’s telecasts.

It is likely that at least a few of the top NFL ad spenders will throw some dollars into the USFL games. In 2020’s abbreviated XFL season, GEICO was the biggest spender over five games with $1.5 million, followed by Progressive with $1.3 million, according to iSpot.tv data.

This past season, Progressive was the biggest NFL ad spender with more than $150 million spent on live game telecasts, while GEICO was the third largest NFL ad spender with more than $135 million, again according to iSpot.tv data.

Verizon was another major NFL spender that advertised in the 2020 XFL season. Other XFL Top 10 ad spenders during that 2020 season, according to iSpot.tv, included Roman ($1.2 million), Domino’s ($650,000), Carfax ($583,000), Taco Bell ($514,000), Wendy’s ($507,000), Liberty Mutual ($487,000) and 5-Hour Energy ($482,000).

The total amounts spent on XFL advertising might not seem like a lot, but it was for only five games, less than one-third of the number of games the NFL played this past year, and advertisers were paying only about $20,000 per 30-second spot, compared to the going NFL rates of between $300,000 and $700,00 per :30.

Sports Betting A Plus

Media buyers believe that what could help grow USFL TV viewership is online sports betting. The USFL recently announced that 15 states have authorized licensed sports betting operators to accept wagers on the league’s games.

But there is one potential downside to drawing in a national audience, too. While the eight original USFL team cities will be represented, all the league’s games will be played in Birmingham, Ala., at two stadiums there.

Will New Jerseyans be particularly avid for New Jersey Generals, for instance, when the team will be playing all of its games in Alabama?

That question will be answered as the season progresses. The initial season is being played in one city to cut down on team travel and production costs.

“Playing in one market will hurt viewership and limit a national following short term, and for year two, they will need to move games into other cities,” one buyer says.

The USFL is controlled by Fox Sports through USFL HoldCo LLC, a new business company that is not associated or affiliated with the original USFL of the 1980s or its owners.

The USFL’s eight initial teams are named after the eight original USFL teams. The USFL owns all of the teams, and the players are employed directly by the USFL. Those involved with the original USFL in the early 1980s have filed a lawsuit attempting to prevent the league from playing, but that matter is still in the courts.

Fox will televise 14 games, FS1 eight games, NBC nine games, NBC’s USA Network nine games and NBC’s Peacock four games. NBC paid Fox a rights fee to televise its 22 games.

Fox In The Driver’s Seat

Since Fox Sports controls the league, it is in the driver’s seat as far as selling sponsorships for the league, both in the stadium and on TV. And unlike the NFL, where the league places all kinds of rules on what can be advertised and how, in the instance of the USFL, Fox Sports can make those determinations.

As one buyer says: “Fox can make up its own rules.”

While Fox is not commenting yet on ad sales, buyers say it has been looking to sell league sponsorships for $750,000, and one buyer says that “for a half million dollars, an advertiser can probably get a unit or two in every game on Fox and FS1.”

As for regular-season TV ads, buyers say both Fox and NBC have been looking to sell packages in increments of $50,000, $100,000 and $200,000.

Syndication Preemptions

Since many of the games on NBC and Fox will be televised on their local affiliates, and since many of the games are on Saturday and Sunday afternoons, there is a likelihood that some local syndicated programming will need to be moved.

That is usually a nightmare for weekend syndicators, but Cassie Yde, president of Television Syndication Co., which distributes eight regular weekly syndicated series that run in various markets on the weekends, says she has not heard yet what impact USFL-caused preemptions will have.

“College and pro football telecasts are the bane of our existence,” she says. “Having our shows moved to less preferable time periods, especially overnight, negatively impacts ad revenue. And under our agreements with the stations, they have the right to move syndicated shows whenever and wherever they want, and we have no recourse.”

As for the local stations, they will get to sell a small amount of ad time in the USFL games and if the ratings can maintain that 2.6 million viewer guarantee, they could benefit.