The Best of Kass

A total of 36 brands have purchased air time so far (as of Jan. 29) for the Super Bowl; Food & Beverage has the majority with 10. Anheuser-Busch InBev (BUD) has the lion's share of the time, buying four and half minutes of air time; with a rumored average cost of $3.8 million per 30-seconds, the estimated cost of providing lots of time looking at Clydesdales and beer is estimated to be $34.2 million. In addition to the dramatic increase in advertising, the company had the Department of Justice block the takeover attempt of Grupo Modelo this week. Perhaps their beer is becoming skunked? Keep an eye on PepsiCo as well; they are on the ad list twice with soda and Doritos as well sponsoring the halftime show.

When my indicator was first released in 2000, dot-coms had spent the most, with the average cost of $2 million for 30-seconds. Of the six Internet companies that had time during the last Super Bowl, just two are returning this year.

In the technology space this year, two companies round out the industry: Samsung and BlackBerry (BBRY, new ticker effective on Feb. 4) -- formerly Research In Motion (RIMM, as if a change of name will solve everything). Samsung has not leaked any previews, but another Apple (AAPL)-bashing ad promoting the company's Galaxy smartphones is likely. BlackBerry will be heavily promoting the BlackBerry 10.

Rounding out the list is the increase in entertainment industry spending. Three movie studios -- Universal, a subsidiary of Comcast (CMCSA); Walt Disney (DIS); and Paramount, a subsidiary of Viacom (VIA) -- have spent an estimated $11.4 million to promote the upcoming summer blockbusters. This suggests studios are attempting to bring more people to the movies. Time Warner (TWX) also bought ad space to promote The Walking Dead, a cult favorite about the zombie apocalypse. No word yet on whether the show is really a documentary on realtors in the housing market. (Century 21 also bought ad time.)

Summary

We might conclude from the historic causality between the indicator and industry composition of Super Bowl advertising that headwinds could be facing both the food & beverage and auto manufacturing industries in 2013-2014.

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