NBCU Expects to Surpass $1.25 Billion in Paris Olympics Ad Sales, Setting New Record

Posted by Jenniffer Sheldon on Wednesday, August 7, 2024

NBCUniversal is setting a record of its own in the 2024 Paris Olympics.

The Comcast-backed media conglomerate expects to win more than $1.25 billion in advertising tied to the big athletic extravaganza, a new high in terms of Madison Avenue backing.

“The 2024 Paris Games have delivered a uniquely powerful halo for brands at an incredible scale with a highly engaged and passionate audience,” said Mark Marshall, NBCU’s chairman of global advertising and partnerships, in a statement. ” We are proud to have secured the highest Olympic and Paralympic advertising in the history of the Games, and are grateful to our advertisers for their partnership.”

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NBCU was believed to have sold around $1.25 billion in national advertising related to its 2021 broadcast of the Olympics Games in Tokyo.

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The company has worked for months to build ad support for its endeavor. Commercials are key to the calculus behind the event, which NBCU and Comcast are in the midst of a $7.75 billion deal that gives them U.S. broadcast rights for the Olympics between 2021 and 2032. Part of the sales pitch was the notion that, with the coronavirus pandemic receding, fans and families would return to the event, creating new buzz, and Paris’ attempts to integrate the Olympics into the city itself would add more color. NBCU also proved willing to test out new ad ideas, such as a commercial-free hour of the Opening Ceremonies that placed logos on screen in place of breaks.

NBCU had notched more than $1.2 billion in support for the Paris Olympics in April, with $350 million signed from advertisers that had not been associated with the event in the past.

The company said on Tuesday that it now had nearly $500 million from new sponsors and that it had captured more advertisers in total than the combined rosters of its Summer Olympics from Rio and Tokyo combined. One of those new sponsors is the medical-apparel company FIGS, which has aligned itself with the appearance of heart-rate monitors that show viewers the metabolic reactions of parents of Olympics athletes watching their kids from the stands.

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