The “March Madness” NCAA basketball tournament will cause more than a billion dollars in lost business productivity. While TV analyst estimate that TV advertising spending on CBS and Turner networks could rise to nearly 1.3 billion Dollars (approx. 1.1 million Euros) this year, the nearly month-long college men’s basketball tournament will mean 1.3 billion Dollars in lost business productivity among business executives, who will watch the games while at the office, according to a study from out-of-home media company Captivate. The Captivate study says over half of business executives – 52% – will watch the game while at the office; with 21% saying they will “secretly” watch it, not letting their superiors know. Another 12% say they will take long lunch breaks to watch the games.
Last year, according to MediaPost’s MediaDailyNews homepage, the “March Madness” event produced 1.19 billion Dollars in TV advertising spending – with the average price for the 2015 NCAA Championship game growing 5% versus the previous year to 1.56 million Dollars. The biggest advertisers of a year ago included: General Motors at 93.3 million Dollars; AT&T with 75.2 millions; Capital One at 44.8 millions; Berkshire Hathaway with $41.4 million; and Coca-Cola at 40.9 million Dollars.
Some 32% of those surveyed – 784 people – believe the March Madness games can be a boost for “office morale.” Nearly 40% will bet on the games; 34% saying they’ll spend 10 Dollarsbetting on their office bracket; 30% will spend 20 Dollars. Elevator and lobby media display company, Captivate, owned by Generation Partners and Gannett, used third-party research companies — including Gfk, MRI, Nielsen, Yankelovich, MarketTools — and a panel of upscale business executives for its Office Pulse study.
This story first appeared in the blog, The Sport Intern. The editor is Karl-Heinz Huba of Lorsch, Germany. He can be reached at ISMG@aol.com. The article is reprinted here with permission of Huba.