It’s been a record year for Super Bowl advertising due to a perfect storm of economic recovery, brands getting back in the game and American’s bottomless appetite for football.

Ad space for the game has been virtually sold out since September and Dan Lovinger, president of ad sales and partnerships for NBCUniversal, told USA Today the top price for a 30-second spot has hit a record $6.5 million,

As Derek Rucker, a professor of marketing at the Kellogg School of Management, noted at Forbes: “There’s a lot you can do in advertising for $6.5 million dollars. In fact, a number of brands will spend more on their Super Bowl spot than other brands will spend throughout the entire year.”

Why? More than 96 million people watch the game.

“A lot of effort goes into designing and delivering Super Bowl spots, and this makes them a spectacle to behold that people want to be a part of. Put simply, Super Bowl ads have become their own cultural experience,” Rucker added.

The Botanist Islay Dry Gin is making a major first-time investment in this year’s Super Bowl, which also marks its first-ever TV commercial.

In support of the Independent Restaurant Coalition (IRC), the commercial is designed to drive awareness of the obstacles that the independent bar and restaurant community in the US continues to navigate as a result of COVID-19. Created by documentary film production company Blacksmith & Jones, the commercial features real-life bar and restaurant staff, amplifying the continued need for support and encouraging viewers to get involved.

However, while halftime sponsor Pepsi and beer giant AB Inbev are back for Super Bowl 2022, drinks brands that participated last year but have declined to return are Cointreau, Mountain Dew and Stella Artois. Coca Cola is also sitting it out for the second year running.

Michelob Ultra has released a teaser for its ad, which features two-time Super Bowl champion Peyton Manning in a bowling alley, while a second add features actor Steve Buscemi playing a bartender.

Pepsi has already been spending big in the lead up to the big game. It has released a nearly three-minute-trailer trailer that celebrates five musical titans — Eminem, Kendrick Lamar, Mary J. Blige, Snoop Dogg and Dr  Dre — who are slated to perform during Pepsi’s halftime show at Super Bowl LVI. 

“A thing this big, we think, deserves its own movie trailer,” says Todd Kaplan, vice president of marketing at Pepsi, in an interview. The company has also released a mobile app that will give fans access to all kinds of content associated with the artists and their looming concert weeks ahead of the Super Bowl kickoff.

Eminem squares off in a rap battle with his alter ego, Slim Shady; Snoop Dogg cruises in a vintage automobile; and Dr Dre strolling by a giant piano on the beach. among other sights. All five artists are summoned to Los Angeles, where they meet and stroll outside the stadium where the game will take place on Sunday, February 13.

Watch it below:

It’s since released a second ad, below:

Last year AB InBev ran ads for Bud Light Seltzer Lemonade, a play on what a lemon of a year 2020 was. It gathered together the stars of Bud Light commercials from the past, including the Bud Light Knight, Post Malone and Cedric the Entertainer, to help save an overturned truck full of beer. This year it’s released an ad for Bud Light Hard Soda.

AB InBev has also released a teaser featuring the iconic Budweiser Clydesdales. Watch it below:

Miller Lite has announced it plans to open a metaverse-based bar during Super Bowl. The virtual space in Decentraland — a platform that offers real estate in the expanding virtual universe — will allow fans to view the beer company’s 2022 Super Bowl ad. The ad will not be airing on the televised game itself.

That’s because AB InBev replaced Molson Coors in 2010 as the NFL’s official alcohol sponsor, preventing the brewer from advertising during the game. However, the metaverse concept allows Miller Lite to creatively sidestep those exclusive rights.