The football industry and women are having an interesting time. This year’s Super Bowl saw their audience drop while still being one of the most watched events. The number is down 7% from the 111.3 million that tuned in for last year’s Super Bowl, making it the least-watched Super Bowl since 2009.
Half of the viewers of the Super Bowl are women. But declining football viewership may have been affected this season by player protests, domestic violence reports and continuing health concerns about players.
Moms are beginning to hold their sons back from the sport. Even Justin Timberlake said he didn’t want his son playing football. Today Show reported the issue of allowing children to play football has become part of a national conversation over the safety of the sport, particularly among youth. Many parents have become skeptical about letting their kids play football because of numerous studies over the link between repeated concussions and lasting brain damage.
On the flip side, women are looking at football as a career. Women make up roughly half of all NFL fans but currently just a third of league employees with no female head coaches or general managers. But the NFL is helping women get on the path to a career in the game with forums on the finer points of coaching, scouting players, and more.
On the advertising side, the 3% Conference were rating the advertising to women. The #3percentsb hashtag asked viewers to rate spots on whether there was a woman in the spot, whether she was defying stereotypes or was she the hero. This year there were less women spokespersons and some tone deaf ads were panned like the Dodge Ram MLK spot. One tweeter said @jtimberlake has more backup dancers and band members that are female than all of the Super Bowl advertisements that have aired so far, combined.
