Commercial Breaks During Televised Sporting Events

I often ask myself why certain things in the world receive a lot more attention than others do.

For example, many years ago it was common to see commercials for cigarettes. Joe Cool and the Marlboro Man were as commonplace as dogs chasing the Chuck Wagon and cats singing 'meow' for Meow Mix.

As we all know, smoking is not good for you. It has been proved to be dangerous. As a result, cigarette advertisements have been removed from TV and magazines. As well, the use of cartoon characters in cigarette logos has been banned in order to reduce the appeal of cigarettes to children. Cigarette sales did not suffer from this sudden lack of advertising. Tobacco companies did not go out of business. Millions upon millions of people still smoke. Tobacco companies are even supporting programs to educate the public of the dangers of smoking, and yet they are still profitable businesses.

Why, then, can we not take this one step further?

It is very frustrating as a parent to try and watch a televised sporting event with my family (something that should be a suitable family activity) and see at least one beer commercial at every break. I understand about target demographics, and that a large portion of the sport-viewing audience is male and of legal drinking age. However, a good portion of the sport-viewing audience is made up of the children of those same males of legal drinking age. While they do exist, commercials advising people to 'drink responsibly' are rare. Largely, we see panoramic vistas of the Rocky Mountains or scenes of people drinking and having a good time. What we do not see are the same people getting into their cars and hitting an unsuspecting pedestrian or the drunken brawl over the fact that 'my team crushed your team!'

I am not asking that the beer companies be responsible for the education of my children - that responsibility falls firmly onto my husband and myself. What I am asking is that the networks and the sporting associations (MLB, NFL, NBA, NHL, etc.) rethink their choice of sponsors. Not too long ago, we sat down to watch a Professional Bull Riding (PBR) event on NBC. It was refreshing to note that the commercial breaks were dominated by trucks, jeans, and trailer hitches - not beer. Granted, your average football and baseball fan probably doesn't really care about a good trailer hitch, but the same demographic that might enjoy a beer or two during the game might also enjoy re-enacting the game on their XBox 360, Wii, or PS3. The point is that there are certainly enough options for sponsors out there with deep enough pockets to provide family-friendly commercials during family-friendly events.

As with cigarettes, we all know that beer exists. Beer drinkers have already determined which brand or brands that they like or dislike, and no amount of advertisement will change that. For example, my husband Greg prefers Coca-Cola to Pepsi. No matter how many Pepsi commercials he sees, he will not magically change his preference. Conversely, he could never see another advertisement for Coca-Cola yet he would continue to drink it.

Cigarette companies have survived the lack of advertising. Would beer companies fare any worse if beer ads were removed from TV? My feeling is that they would continue to thrive as well, and I would be more able to enjoy watching sporting events with my family.