Let me start off by admitting I don’t watch professional sports. My bet is it was only because I gave up on the Cubs that they won the World Series. So maybe we’re both better off.
I also don’t get the farmer obsession with the Super Bowl and beer ads. The reason is I don’t think it matters that much now and really won’t in the future. It just doesn’t look to me like football and beer will be a big part of what’s coming.
First, football. Here are the 10 most popular sports and their followers according to the World Atlas. Note what is NOT on it. Worse still, for the first time in 3 decades the number of high school football players dropped. Football revenues at the pro and college level amount to about $40 billion, but different sources vary somewhat. Meanwhile, the estimates for video gaming – not gambling, but Pokemon and Fortnite, add up to around $125B. Some 1 million kids play football, over 125 million American adults play video games. All the numbers are approximate I know, but the any comparison verifies the stark truth that football is a small part of the recreation economy and will get smaller.
In the same way, beer has its own popularity problem. Not only are alcoholic beverages as a whole declining, but beer consumption is leading the way. Bud Lite – by far the best-selling brand – just reported its 5th annual sales drop.
So while farmers like beer and football, the rest of the world – which is a very large number - is drinking other stuff while doing other activities. Maybe advertising that we see and worry about never really touches most people. In fact, the farmer reaction may be the most effective result for spreading the ad’s message.
The clincher is how corn growers are investing time and outrage over a product that uses a teensy portion of our crop, about 1%. Seems to me we have much bigger markets with much bigger problems.
Farmers have been quick to mock critics they think are overly sensitive on issues like animal welfare and crude language, calling them snowflakes. Maybe growers who obsess over this trivial perceived slight to our industry could be labeled cornflakes.
