This year’s Super Bowl is getting a sugar rush with a modern-day record number of candy and sweets brands advertising, as consumers reach for nostalgic treats to ward off stress.

So far, five sweets brands have confirmed plans to run Big Game ads on CBS during the game on Feb. 11—M&M’s, Nerds, Oreo, Drumstick and Reese’s. Nerds and Drumstick are Super Bowl rookies and Oreo and Reese’s have only occasionally run ads in the game.

The investments in advertising’s most expensive venue far exceed what the game has typically drawn from the category. In the past 20 years, the highest number of sweets brands advertising in a single Super Bowl was three—in 2016, Butterfinger, Skittles and Snickers ran ads; and in 2020, Pop-Tarts, Reese’s Take 5 and Snickers appeared, according to the Ad Age Super Bowl Ad Archive.

The uptick in sugary spots represents new Big Game competition for Mars—the owner of M&M’s, Snickers and Skittles—which has advertised in 13 of the past 14 Super Bowls, while often leveraging its status as an official NFL sponsor. 

When asked about the dynamic, Jessica Adelman, senior VP of corporate affairs at Mars North America, said, “It’s exciting to see the confectionary category receiving so much Super Bowl love,” adding that the Big Game is “familiar territory for Mars.” 

Experts point to several reasons why the Super Bowl might be attractive to sweets brands this year, including a resurgence in nostalgic marketing, a bump in ad spending in the category, and, for some brands, the chance to speak directly to younger consumers.

“There’s the feeling of, ‘The world was nicer when I was younger’ and people want to indulge in that,” said Marcia Mogelonsky, senior director of insights for food and drink at Mintel. “There is also the idea that if we’re going to ‘sin’ by eating sweets, we want to eat something we know we will like, that tastes the same as it did when we were kids.”

Jenny Zegler, director of food and drink at Mintel, agreed. “We are heading into an interesting year—there are wars, conflicts, return to work policies, and an election year,” Zegler said. “That’s a lot of stressors. But the Super Bowl would be a prime time to remind consumers those treats are here.”

More from Ad Age: The 40 best ads of 2023 

‘Alleviate the seriousness of adulthood’

“I do think consumers are increasingly focused on indulgent treats during challenging times and we can look to current consumer trends to understand the reasoning for the uptick,” Michelle Deignan, VP of Oreo U.S. wrote in an email. “This year, we’re looking to up the ante and fans can expect the cookie brand to continue to find unexpected ways to alleviate the seriousness of adulthood.”

Mondelēz-owned Oreo last advertised in the 2013 game, when it won widespread attention for its “You can still dunk in the dark” tweet after the lights went off during the game at what was then known as the Mercedes-Benz Superdome. 

The investments come as the candy industry has seen an uptick in sales revenue despite lower unit sales. Chocolate candy raked in $19.5 billion in sales in 2023, up nearly 6% from 2022, while non-chocolate candy saw $11.2 billion in sales, up 12% from 2022, according to market research firm Circana. Candy, like most food categories, has been priced higher due to inflation.

Brands have also been investing more in marketing. As of November, U.S. ad spending by candy companies was up 23% year-over-year, surpassing $350 million, much of it going to TV, according to a report by MediaRadar, an ad intelligence firm. The four brands that spent the most were M&M’s, Butterfinger, Nerds and Werther’s Original—each invested over $30 million from January 2023 to November 2023, according to the report. Mondelēz-owned Sour Patch Kids rounded out the top five with over $20 million in ad spend.

Nerds’ decision to advertise in the Super Bowl this year comes after recent growth that led the brand to increase its manufacturing capacity by 360% and triple its marketing investments, according to a brand representative. The Ferrara-owned brand pointed to its gummy clusters product, a chewy candy rolled in Nerds, as a big driver. Nerds Gummy Clusters have achieved 15% U.S. household penetration, and its Super Bowl spot is aimed at the other 85% Nerds Chief Marketing Officer Greg Guidotti, told Business Insider.

Hershey Co. reported $2.4 billion in third-quarter net sales for its North America Confectionery segment, up 10% from a year earlier. Mars is privately owned, but in 2022 M&M’s spent $105 million on measured media and $57 million in the first half of 2023, according to Vivvix, which includes paid social data from Pathmatic.

In 2022, Oreo spent $100 million on measured media and $61 million in the first half of 2023, according to Vivvix, which includes paid social data from Pathmatics.

Drumstick parent company Froneri shared in a press release from June 2023 that U.S sales had grown compared to the year prior, but did not share exact figures. The release also said that the company is continuing to invest in U.S. factories to increase capacity and that, “this has helped us improve our service levels by more than 10%.”

The candy and sweets brands in the game have yet to disclose creative approaches, outside of Drumstick, which confirmed its ad would star comedian Eric André and the brand’s mascot, Dr. Umstick.

Drumstick has leaned on the nostalgia of summer for previous campaigns, but its most recent creative features Dr. Umstick, an irreverent spokescharacter who marries, well, a Drumstick. The absurdity of Dr. Umstick seems to be in line with the more absurdist humor that fans got to see during the wildly popular Pop-Tarts Bowl, which saw a pastry mascot get toasted and eaten by the winning team.

Drumstick is the first candy brand out with a teaser, which suggests its spot could have an air travel theme.

Sales driver

Of course, buying a Super Bowl ad comes with significant risk—brands must make the multi-million investment pay off in the form of a sales boost.

“There needs to be a truth about your brand that people remember,” said Paul Chibe, CEO of Pabst Brewing Company, and the former president and CEO of candy maker Ferrero North America. “The creative execution needs to have the right tone that is entertaining, but also intrinsically linked to your brand.”

“The Super Bowl is still a unique and powerful media vehicle,” added Chibe, who oversaw several Super Bowl ads when he was U.S. VP of marketing at Anheuser-Busch InBev from 2011 to 2014. “There’s been continued fragmentation and audience delivery is tougher, but the Super Bowl—that’s big reach and if you do it well, the earned media is unmatched,” he said.

Ryan Riess, VP of brand strategy and creative development at Reese’s owner Hershey Co. agreed that the Super Bowl is a rare moment of shared viewing. “Having an occasion where so many people are watching together and having that shared experience is rare now,” he said.

One way for sweets brands to make their investment pay off is through retail marketing in advance of the game. 

“Retailers want to have the products consumers want,” Riess said. “So when they know millions of people will see our ad, and that our product is accessible through a number of distribution points and price points, our retailers get excited. I think they appreciate us driving folks to their store. We create the pull and they help with the push.”

Hershey Co., which is making only its third Super Bowl appearance, has not disclosed details on the 30-second Reese’s ad, only saying it would play on the “extreme passion” sports fans have while rooting for their favorite team.

‘Pester power’

This year’s game presents a new opportunity for sweets brands—a kids-friendly broadcast of the game airing on Nickelodeon, whose audience might entice candy brands. Paramount owns CBS and Nickelodeon and ad buyers buying CBS ads for the game were granted mirrored slots for Nick ads, although, as Ad Age reported today, there has been confusion from ad buyers about the process. 

Sweets brands interested in running ads on Nickelodeon must also navigate potential regulatory hurdles.

Many major candy makers—including Mondelēz, Ferrara, Hershey, Nestlé and Mars—have pledged to not directly advertise to children under the age of 13 as part of the Children’s Food and Beverage Advertising Initiative (CFBAI). But the CFBAI is a voluntary pledge program, and determining if a TV ad is primarily aimed at children is based on the percent of the viewing audience that is estimated to be kids. If 30% or more of the anticipated audience is children, then CBFAI commitments are applicable. 

“We have it on background that the expected audience for the Nickelodeon Super Bowl is well below 30% children, which means that advertising on the program is not primarily directed to children,” Maureen Enright, VP of CFBAI, said via email.

So far, Nerds, Reese’s and M&M’s have confirmed Nickelodeon ad buys. 

“Reese’s will run our big game advertisement as part of the family-viewing Nickelodeon simulcast of Super Bowl LVII,” Reese's shared in an emailed statement. “As a nontraditional Nickelodeon advertiser, airing our ad in this first-ever Super Bowl simulcast is an opportunity to capture the family viewing experience of one of the largest cultural events of the year while still remaining true to our long-term CFBAI pledge.”

Those double placements for Nerds, Reese’s and M&M’s will easily get them in front of younger consumers at a time when the viewing habits of kids and adolescents have shifted away from traditional TV to streaming or mobile viewing, according to Fran Fleming-Milici, director of marketing initiatives for the Rudd Center for Food Policy and Health at the University of Connecticut.

“Sports are one of the few things that people still watch live, and they don’t change the channel when the ads come on,” Fleming-Milici said. “So while there has been a decline in viewership, this is a chance for an ad to reach a lot of folks.” 

“It could also up the ‘pester power’ of kids,” Mintel’s Zegler said. “If a candy ad airs on Nick, maybe they start asking for more candy. And if it also aired on CBS, you get both of those messages to both generations and maybe that makes it easier to pick up the product next time you’re in the grocery aisle.”