Viewers will be offered beer and bets – Newspaper Kommersant No. 6 (7451) dated 01/16/2023

The Russian Football Union, the Russian Ice Hockey Federation and the Continental Hockey League propose to introduce relaxations in the law on advertising for bookmakers and alcohol brands. We are talking about allowing advertising of bookmakers on the facades of stadiums, as well as using images of people in it, which is currently prohibited, and allowing advertising of alcoholic beer on TV during sports broadcasts and in the sports media. This will increase the revenue of the leagues by expanding the advertising budgets and opportunities of bookmakers and beer brands, experts believe. But the FAS and the Ministry of Labor have already opposed such initiatives.

A Kommersant source in the betting market said that the Russian Football Union (RFU), as well as the Russian Ice Hockey Federation (FHR) and the Kontinental Hockey League (KHL) have prepared proposals to change the law “On Advertising”, which involve a number of relaxations to promote bookmakers. According to him, they are planned to be discussed in the State Duma on January 24. Three more interlocutors of Kommersant in the market speak about this.

According to Kommersant’s sources, the leagues are asking to allow bookmakers to advertise on the territory of sports facilities (now by law this is possible “in sports facilities”), that is, not only inside the bowl of stadiums, but also, for example, on their facade. We are also talking about the fact that bookmakers can use images of people in advertising (now, by law, they cannot use images of people and animals) and, in general, place ads for bookmakers on the websites of leagues and federations.

The proposals concern not only bookmakers, but also beer and beer drinks during sporting events, “the list of which will be determined later,” says one of Kommersant’s interlocutors.

The authors of the initiative ask to allow advertising of alcoholic beer in sports online publications, on league websites and on TV channels during broadcasts, on sports facilities, athletes’ equipment and tickets. Now, according to the law “On Advertising”, advertising of beer should not be placed in sports facilities and at a distance of less than 100 m from them.

The relaxations, according to the interlocutor, “could significantly increase the advertising revenues of leagues, federations and clubs and create opportunities for media platforms to increase advertising revenue.” The RFU is involved in the development of proposals to amend the law on advertising, “aimed at increasing the commercial market income of sports federations, leagues and clubs,” they confirmed there. The FHR and KHL did not respond to inquiries.

Such ideas have been put forward before: on December 22, at a meeting in the FAS, the chairman of the subcommittee of the Chamber of Commerce and Industry (CCI) of the Russian Federation on betting and sweepstakes, Nikolai Oganezov, also suggested using the images of athletes in advertising and placing it on the entire territory of sports facilities. Mr. Oganezov clarified to Kommersant that the Chamber of Commerce and Industry of the Russian Federation is working on a separate set of proposals.

However, the FAS has already opposed the initiative:

“Given the high risk of excessive enthusiasm for such games, betting, including the likelihood of an increase in the number of emerging facts of ludomania (pathological gambling) among the population, an increase in the attractiveness of advertising such games, the bet cannot be considered reasonable.”

The use of images of people will allow attracting athletes as ambassadors and will have a positive impact on the recognition of betting brands, says Petr Kipa, BetBoom Marketing Director. Now the ban on the use of people and animals leads to the fact that all “legal” commercials of bookmakers are similar, while the videos on pirate sites are different, “it is possible to redistribute part of the budgets from gray sites,” says Victoria Baranova, head of the strategic direction of Mediasystem (Group4Media).

PR Development CEO Alla Aksenova says that bookmakers are already “maximally integrated” on television, therefore, in her opinion, the changes could theoretically increase their budgets in online video, outdoor advertising, “it is possible that ads with the voices of famous people will appear on the radio, because that before the bookmakers could not use them.” Acting President of AB InBev Efes (brands Spaten, Velkopopovicky Kozel, Old Miller from a Barrel, Sibirskaya Korona, Klinskoye, etc.) an investment that could be a tangible boost to the sports and advertising industries.”

It has been proposed to return beer advertising on TV during broadcasts of sports competitions in Russia since 2018, when a corresponding bill was submitted to the State Duma. However, it was never adopted: the idea was supported by the Ministry of Digital Development, but opposed by the Ministry of Labor.

Valeria Lebedeva