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Customers of legal dispensaries around the U.S. may hike their spending on cannabis ahead of Super Bowl Sunday, but not on the day of the big game, according to a market research company.
If 2022 follows trends from last year, cannabis sales will rise significantly ahead of this year’s matchup between the Cincinnati Bengals and the Los Angeles Rams.
Sales of cannabis jumped 33% over daily February sales on the Friday before the Super Bowl in 2021, and increased by 22% on the day before kickoff, according to New York-based marketing technology company Surfside Solutions Inc.
With cannabis users settled down in front of their screens on game day, cannabis sales dropped 28% than the average daily total on Super Bowl Sunday. The sales total for the day also amounts to the worst Sunday in all of February and March.
Jon Lowen, co-founder of Surfside, said he expects the uptick in cannabis sales ahead of the Super Bowl to repeat in 2022. Consumers tend to increase their purchases and the quantity that they buy ahead of the big game.
People are gathering more recently, he said, referring to increased social activity as the omicron variant of the coronavirus recedes.
“The Super Bowl being in California may help as well. We tend to see that when events are held in a state with recreational cannabis, you get a large influx of tourists that may be from other states that aren’t fully recreational and we see an uplift from that.”
Cannabis isn’t the only thing on people’s minds ahead of the Super Bowl. This year, fans are projected to bet $1 billion on the Super Bowl, according to PlayUSA.
In a new twist to the TV broadcast, cryptocurrency exchanges trading bitcoin
BTCUSD,
and ethereum
ETHUSD,
will play a starring role in the game’s advertising blitz.
But no cannabis. Adweek reported on Tuesday that an ad from Weedmaps featuring a metaphorical reference to cannabis in the form of a character called Brock Ollie — who looks like broccoli — was rejected by NBC-TV.
An NBC spokesperson told Adweek that its does not accept any advertisements for cannabis or cannabis-related businesses.
For the football season including Super Bowl Sunday, about 70% of U.S. consumers planned to buy snacks, 31% said they would purchase team licensed apparel, 17% planned to buy TV and home-theater electronics and 13% had their eye on grills, chairs, coolers and other gear for tailgating, according to a poll by NPD/CivicScience.
“Snacking is synonymous with watching football, whether you’re watching it from the stands or on a TV,” said Darren Seifer, food and beverage analyst for NPD, in a blog entry.
NPD measured a 143% increase of pairing dips with salty and savory snacks while watching football, with a 61% jump in salsa use.
In terms of top cannabis holidays during the first quarter, St. Patrick’s Day outsells Valentine’s Day and Super Bowl Sunday, Surfside said. The holiday celebrating the patron saint of Ireland generates 23% higher sales than Valentine’s Day Weekend and 27% higher sales than Super Bowl Weekend. The green holiday also outpaces average March daily sales by 54%.
Meanwhile the Friday before Valentines Day drew a 37% boost in cannabis sales over the average daily February sales tally.
Surfside compiles its data from millions of e-commerce and dispensary transactions using the data is sells to cannabis businesses for targeting, advertising, and customer research.
