Inside the $1 billion Super Bowl advertising complex

This is when it all really begins. We’re two weeks before the Super Bowl. You’re watching the NFL’s conference championship games. But life isn’t so carefree for anyone involved in the elite, high-stakes game-within-the-game of creating ads for the big event, the one time they truly have your attention during the ad breaks. With two weeks to go, this marks the point when brands and their agencies really have to crank up their efforts—and their anxiety—for the final push to break through with a winning Super Bowl commercial and campaign.

After months of planning, producing, strategizing, and, yes, spending to prepare, ad agencies and brands are in the throes of the final hectic days before the biggest advertising day of the year. Sure, there have been some early birds like FanDuel and M&M’s getting a head start on the hype cycle, but this weekend we will see a rush of brand action on TV, online, and across social media.

As advertising investments go, there is still plenty of debate around the value of the Super Bowl. What’s irrefutable is that it remains the biggest single-day audience—and live TV cultural moment—in American pop culture. And its price for brands reflects that status.

A 30-second spot in this year’s game on Fox costs as much as $7 million, up from $6.5 million last year. But the media buy is just one of three main costs involved in creating a Super Bowl campaign, along with production and talent. According to various agency sources, production costs run around $2.5 million to $3 million, with teasers typically built into the equation, and all shot at the same time. Celebrity talent is variable depending on the wattage of the star, and can cost anywhere from $500,000 to upwards of $10 million.

There are approximately 50 minutes of ad time, and then throw in whatever agency fees can be attributed to Super Bowl work. So although there are no hard industry numbers on this, we’re talking about a roughly $1 billion enterprise for basically one Sunday night in February.

Given the stakes, both cultural and financial, I was curious about the mood among those making these ads as we get closer to the Super Bowl. What’s left to be done? What happens now?

The folks at Wieden+Kennedy are making Super Bowl ads for a few brands this year, including FanDuel, Michelob Ultra, and TurboTax. Gerard Caputo is the agency’s group creative director working on FanDuel, and this is the seventh Super Bowl ad of his career. He tells me that right now the mood within the agency is fun and energetic. The spots and teasers are all made, and they’re in the process of final brand and broadcast network approvals.

“It’s always fun. It’s the biggest time of the year for making ads, and people are excited,” Caputo says. “You’re coming into the new year, the Super Bowl is the moment when everyone is getting back in their groove. People start talking about advertising in a more fun way, and that energizes people, sometimes for the rest of the year.”

Over at Droga5, which is making Molson Coors’s first in-game Super Bowl ads in 33 years, chief creative officer Scott Bell says that this weekend is the definition of crunch time. “At this point, it’s finishing all the final touches of the ad,” Bell says. “The special effects, the music, the tiny details that’ll make the commercial really sing. It’s amazing how the last 1% always makes such a huge difference. Also, there are way more levels of clearance and approvals for the Super Bowl, so we’re making sure everyone has given it a thumbs-up.”

Making a Super Bowl spot is a unique experience for a few reasons. First, it’s the most high-profile work any ad agency will do. At the family Thanksgiving table, talking to a stranger on an airplane, when people know you work in advertising, often the first question is “Have you ever made a Super Bowl commercial?”

Caputo says that while there is added pressure on this moment, there also can be a surprising amount of freedom. “Clients—and everyone—just kind of let go a lot of their shit,” Caputo says. “It’s the Super Bowl, and they know they need to be ambitious, so it’s when you get everyone at their best. A lot of times, clients will let go of concerns they’d typically hold on to in a normal campaign. So you get a bit more freedom, and that’s one of the things that makes doing a Super Bowl ad unique, because everyone is really just going for it.”

Both Caputo’s and Bell’s work this year experiments with how a brand can build to its big-game moment. For FanDuel, Wieden+Kennedy has made three ads starring former NFL pro Rob Gronkowski, all leading to a live spot during the game, in which Gronkowski will attempt a field goal that could result in a $10 million payout shared among FanDuel users.

“[This week] we’re working on our graphics package, we’re sourcing fireworks, we’re getting fiber-optic cable run into the facility,” Caputo says. “Then we’ll be there well in advance of the game to block it all out and make sure everything’s working. We won’t rehearse the kick, but we do need to know how we’re going to shoot it. It all has to be planned as a live event.”

Droga5’s work for Molson Coors has pitted two of the company’s beer brands head-to-head, with Coors Light and Miller Lite’s “High Stakes Beer Ad.” It’s partnered with DraftKings to give fans the chance to win part of $500,000 by making predictions about the commercials.

“We wanted to treat the release the same way any sportsbook would treat a massive betting occasion,” Bell says. “Working closely with DraftKings, we devised a plan that would not only maximize participation but would also make sure the anticipation for the ad was peaking on Super Bowl Sunday.”

Celebrities starring in Super Bowl ads are also pressed into action this week. Tim Curtis is a partner in WME’s celebrity endorsements division and oversees the talent agency’s Super Bowl initiatives. The company has about 30 clients in Super Bowl ads, ranging from on-camera to voice-over talent, as well as for both national and regional ads. He says to expect most of the big-game celebrities to be musicians, but there still could be some surprises.

While most brands have creative finalized and talent locked in by the fall, and then everything shot before the holidays, with editing taking place in January there are always stragglers. “They like to wait and see, look for who’s having a cultural moment,” Curtis says. “Come January 1, they still haven’t done anything, have no idea what direction they’re going in, and they do it in the second or third week of January every year. It’s then a real scramble to get it shot, edited, and done. It’s frustrating and exciting at the same time.”

Two weeks from now, everyone will be watching. Caputo says that the best client and agency partnerships are all a lot more collaborative. “Now the day of the Super Bowl, you may just be texting with your clients and it’s really celebratory,” he says. “Maybe you’re sharing responses to the work out in the world. There’s usually a group chat, and overall it’s okay to enjoy the moment a bit.”

Caputo’s Super Bowl Sunday this year will be somewhat different, given that he’s actually shooting the ad live as the game is happening. After seven tries, it’s the closest he’ll be to the action. “I’ve never been to an actual Super Bowl.”