...and I don't like pro ball anyway. This wasteful extravagance when people are homeless and starving in the US. I wouldn't tune in if they paid me to do it. I can't think of a word to describe it that would do it justice. Shameful is one, but too mild imo.

Companies tout their $4M ads, but the unexpected could change everything

NEW YORK, N.Y. - Super Bowl advertisers are finally about to see their efforts play out on the industry's biggest stage Sunday night. But as they've learned in the past, anything can happen.

Companies Coca-Cola, Mars and Nestle have spent the past several days trying to drum up hype for their big-money ads, in some cases by releasing teasers online. Anheuser Busch InBev even hosted a viewing party for its ads aboard a cruise ship docked at a New York City pier, which was transformed into a floating "Bud Light Hotel," complete with escargot, duck and cheesecake on the menu.

.................

FIRST QUARTER: BUD LIGHT'S FEAR OF MISSING OUT

How important is the Super Bowl to Bud Light? The beer has three ads airing during the game.

In case that wasn't enough, it also has a massive party ship docked at a New York pier with the words "THE BUD LIGHT HOTEL" emblazoned on the side. The ship is on loan from Norwegian Cruise Lines and is serving as a base for about 4,000 guests. After taking control of it earlier this week, Anheuser Busch slapped its Bud Light logo on just about everything in less than 24 hours, down to the tiny shampoo bottles in the cabins.

Even crew members' uniforms have Bud Light stitched onto the sleeves.

Tucked away in a room aboard the ship on Sunday will be Bud Light's "social command centre," complete with giant flat screen TVs and computers to monitor whatever may be happening.

In case the 18-member team is second-guessing a tweet it dreams up, Anheuser Busch says its legal team will be on call for consultation.
........
Etc. Etc.

http://www.calgaryherald.com/business/C ... story.html

The Budweiser puppy ad had me from the opening. The little yellow puppies looked like Chewy.

I love pro football. I will always unashamedly love pro football.

This Super Bowl was the most boring I can remember in recent years. It had nothing to do with being in New Jersey. The weather was actually perfect for football. The game was a lop-sized blowout without any drama, and that was the problem.

Football teams all have their charities associated with them. The Eagles help 50K low income kids in Philly with health initiatives (like free glasses), education initiatives like the book mobile, and community initiatives like building new playgrounds. The professional sports teams give back to the community. There is definitely wretched excess in the NFL, but they do give back some of that excess.

I was talking about the sponsors, not the teams.

Here's another reason, roseanne ~ gotta factor in the GOP/TP hate-filled fans too ~ this is SO STUPID!!! ~ this idiocy is why we can't have nice things ~ ~ personally, I see the ad as terrific! ~ Sooz

AlterNet / By Alex Kane
Coke's Multilingual "America the Beautiful" Ad Sparks Conservative Outrage
A Super Bowl commercial featuring a polyglot America outraged right-wingers—some of whom thought "America the Beautiful" was the national anthem.

February 3, 2014 | Coca-Cola is by no means a progressive company. The soda maker has long been targeted for boycotts by some labor rights groups for undermining workers’ rights at bottling plants in Colombia--and being complicit in the deaths of the labor organizations. There's also the environmental waste their plastic bottles generate.

But on Sunday night, during the Super Bowl, they became a target of a much different kind of boycott lead by conservatives. A Coca-Cola ad featured the song “America the Beautiful” in multiple languages. Images of a Muslim woman, a Jewish man, and more flashed on the screen.

Right-wingers were none too pleased. On Twitter, the hashtag #boycottcoke picked up steam, though some of that was progressives’ making fun of their outrage.

Outside of Twitter, the outrage was just as ridiculous. Former Congressman and Tea Party star Allen West wrote that it was “a truly disturbing commercial,” as Talking Points Memo notes.

Coke used “a deeply Christian patriotic anthem whose theme is unity – in several foreign languages,” wrote Michael Patrick Leahy on Breibart.com, who added that it featured gay people--the horror!

Perhaps the funniest part of the whole affair was some Twitter xenophobes saying the ad desecrated the “national anthem.” In case they’re reading this: it’s not the national anthem.

Watch the ad here:


http://www.alternet.org/news-amp-politics/cokes-multilingual-america-beautiful-ad-sparks-outrage

Budweiser? Cheerios? Radio Shack?

We saw most of the ads before. It was a fairly lackluster year for ads.

The sponsors that paid millions for their ads and had parties on cruise ships etc.

Please read the OP and my comments. Maybe that will clarify it for you. I highlighted some of the outrageous spending.

These types are always looking for the boogeyman in the closet. In fact they can't see beyond the darkness in there to the reality that the country is multi-cultural. "National Anthem" lmao. Their ignorance still amazes me.

I read your opening post, Roseanne. You opened up bashing football and then went into extravagance.

Corporations have advertising budgets. Anheuser-Busch's goal is to sell product. Anheuser-Busch's party ship in NYC was the Norwegian Breakaway and it's owned by Harrah's/Caesars.

Caesar's Atlantic City had an invitation only TRAIN concert and then had Joe Montana and Barry Sanders do a Superbowl Chalk Talk. Their motivation was to bring the gamblers into their casino.

I frequent Harrah's/Caesars and I've been on the Breakaway and saw TRAIN. The casinos are viewed as the evil empire however, they donate their excess food to the homeless shelters in the area. While this was NOT a cold snap, when AC was a Code Blue a short while ago and the homeless were taken to the shelters from the street by the police, the casinos fed them.

I am not a fan of homelessness or hunger. I get positively livid about alcohol and drug abuse, but I still don't see the shamefulness in this scenario.

Where did I bash football?? Just because I said I hate the Super Bowl and I don't like pro football? Sensitive, are you? I actually love college football tyvm.

If you don't see the shamefulness, then ok. Whatever.

Rightwingnuts are racists and bigots.

I'm with roseanne on ths one. I also include in the shame the people who pay so much to go to the damned game. I have trouble giving credit to the big companies for the small (comparably) things they do for charity when one of their CEO's bonuses alone could feed thousands for a year. They try to turn it into some patriotic thing and say it's for the servicemen and women etc while miltary famlies are having to use food stamps and can't get the medical help they need. How many elderly went to the hospital while the game was on with serious problems because they can't afford heat? How many kids will turn to gangs because the schools suck? But at least some homeless people get rich people's leftovers from a casino? I hate the salaries for the actors and athletes and CEOs. Yeah, I guess I'm one of those rich people haters. So be it. I am unashamedly so. As long as we have so many without the basic necessities I will cringe at the casual mention of $4 million for a commercial, $15 million for a wedding, $3,000 for a purse and on and on.

All this horror because people like professional football and the advertisers know that???? 111M horrible Super Bowl watchers who should all be ashamed of ourselves???

I was at the hospital hours before the big game and basically the census was DOWN. Just like it is on Christmas. People generally want to be WITH their families on holidays and before big events.

Kids will turn to gangs because of the Super Bowl? Schools don't have funding because of the Super Bowl? The elderly are using food stamps and freezing to death because of the Super Bowl???

That's all ridiculous.

Um, kathy, why don't you calm down and actually read the post. Ha. Where did say the super bowl caused all those things? Where did I say all who watch it should be ashamed? I, as I think roseanne was, am talking about the excess, the extravagance, the waste. Super bowl is an example of that. We are talking about the money being blown on such things that could be better used. Yes, the advertisers are smart and think they will make money because of that huge investment. That's business. That's part of the problem. It's all about profit, all about people who have lots of money spending it on such stuff. I'm an old lefty who happens to have different priorities. Always have and always will. Yeah if that money was spent nstead on things like schools, medical needs, basic necessities for the people who have not I would be happier with the people who have. That will never happen.

Kathy, you want to see the other side of Christmas and such? Work a crisis hotline on the holidays.

I'm sorry, kathy, but your response to my post really cracks me up.

Glad to entertain, Jeanne. I am capable of reading both your and Roseanne's posts.

I am perfect calm. I actually think you and Roseanne are going after the wrong targets.

I also think there is a inverse snobbism in both of your points of view.

Now, laugh away!!!!

Kathy, obviously, you did NOT read our posts because your responses stated things to be said by us that we did not say.

Inverse snobbism? Ha. If you mean I get irritated at rich people who waste so much when so many others don't even have the basic necessities ..... you betcha.

Football's ok, but it would be more interesting if teams were serious about their rivalries.

Hockey has gone to shyte as well... about on par with pro wrestling.
I don't bother with it anymore.

Last time we watched a baseball game there were so many silly mistakes made by these millions of dollars players. We enjoy the B team in Austin because the guys really enjoy playing good baseball.

Kind of prefer the Lingerie League, myself.

Still, what puzzles me about the arguments over rich people is how would taking money away from them benefit anybody else. If Joe Fatcheque only got one million dollars salary instead of $10 million, how would that help Faye Homeless. It's not like someone would say, "Hey, we've got this spare nine million. Lrt's give it to some poor guy." In all likelihood the money simply wouldn't exist.

None of this righteous indignation makes any sense to me at all. Anheuser Busch has an advertising budget. They spend $4M to air the ad during the Superbowl or they break it up and play it during the year? It's going to be used for advertising and it's not going to the homeless. Anheuser Busch sells a lot of beer, makes a profit, and as a result of their ads and their employees stay employed.

The whole hate of pro football and the Super Bowl and shamefulness of those of us who like football sounded totally ridiculous to me.

grrrrrrr........kathy where did anyone say " shamefulness of those of us who like football". Ha. My goodness you really are sensitive on this one. The point was the waste of money and the extravagance when people are suffering. The super bowl is just one example of it.

Those beer companies could give more to help people out instead of huge bonuses to a few. All big companies could. Rich people could give more to help people out instead of the crap with the yachts and huge parties and waste, pure waste. A lot of rich give tons of time and money and work. More should do the same. I won't apologize for thinking hungry kids etc. are more important than a football game.

Don't pay dufus the $10 million bonus. Instead, put the $10 million towards better job training, or a school like sooz's, or non profit clinics, to help keep food banks full, etc. IMO, it would be better spent helping to make sure all have their basic needs. Not sure why that bothers Kathy so much.

It is what it is, Jeanne. I don't like shaming people for liking what they like. I particularly don't like it when people try to shame me for liking what I like.

I thought you didn't approve companies giving people a few crumbs. Feeding the homeless in the Atlantic City shelters was no good, not enough.

How do you know the Bud Lite people organizing the party on the Breakaway don't help people? Arranging and going to parties are not sins.

If you want to disapprove of stuff, disapprove of the human trafficking that occurred at the Super Bowl and everywhere across the globe. They caught them though. That's really good.

Excuse me? Ha. I disapprove of a country full of hypocrites that claim to care about people because they have given them a few crumbs while they blow a thousand times that much on bullshit.

Kathy, no one tried to shame you for liking football or the super bowl. Geez, where do you get that? Why are you including yourself in with the people we were talking about? How funny is that. The people we are talking about feel no shame.

BTW, I have been actively fighting against human trafficking for decades. Am I only allowed to disapprove of one thing at a time?

OMG!!! Read your posts. I don't even know what people you are talking about? You are fussing about a party on the Breakaway. My TRAIN concert at Caesar's was an equivalent party at a different location with the same owners. I don't quite see how I would not personalize that. I was a guest and your diatribe seemed that all those reveling for the Super Bowl are cold, uncaring monsters who don't care about starving children.

The $4M for the ad marketing budget I guess goes to Fox, but it's marketing budget. It's never going to the homeless. TPTB decided it was money well spent. They sell more budget if 111M households see the ad at one time during the game. The networks need ads to keep their doors open.