Anyone who watches sports is used to seeing betting ads during games, but a collaboration between CBC’s Marketplace and British researchers at the University of Bristol found gambling messages fill up to 21 per cent of each broadcast, on average, based on an analysis that looked at seven games.
Marketplace asked the researchers to count the number of gambling messages — including betting company logos, commercials, sponsored segments and any time betting odds appeared on screen — viewers were exposed to during five NHL games and two NBA games broadcast live on television between Oct. 25 and Oct. 29.
An average hockey or basketball broadcast runs roughly three hours. The research team reviewed footage for all seven broadcasts, and also reviewed any available pre-game show, which usually ran about half an hour.
Their study tallied 3,537 gambling messages across all broadcasts, or about 2.8 every minute, totalling one-fifth of the viewing time.
“It’s shocking the amount of gambling-related messages that bombard the audience when they’re just trying to watch a game,” said Jamie Wheaton, who studies gambling at the University of Bristol and led the research on the NHL/NBA games with Raffaello Rossi.
More than 90 per cent of the logos or references were found directly on the playing surface, or court- or rink-side.
FanDuel was the brand with the most messages across the seven broadcasts, accounting for more than a quarter of the total gambling messages in the study.
Markus Giesler, a professor of marketing at York University in Toronto, reviewed the results and said he’s worried about how seamless the integration of sports and gambling has become.
“All of this is contributing to the normalization of gambling,” Giesler said. “Something that we conventionally think of as a very risky and a very dangerous practice [is framed] as something that’s actually just fun and harmless.”
Ontario launched regulated market in 2022
Wheaton, Rossi and their colleagues did similar work counting gambling advertisements during the opening weekend of English Premier League soccer games in the U.K. this past August. They found nearly five messages per minute across 24 hours of coverage and described the advertising as “inescapable.”
Ontario is the only province with a regulated market for private gambling companies to operate in. Regulated casino and sports betting in all other Canadian regions is handled through a provincially run website.
Since Ontario launched the regulated market in April 2022, gambling has exploded in the province. iGaming Ontario, which manages this market, reported players wagered more than $17 billion in the third quarter of 2022/23. Since the launch of the regulated market, revenues for gambling companies have quadrupled, from a total of $162 million as of June 30, 2022, to more than $658 million by Dec. 31, 2023.
Jamie Wheaton, a researcher who studies gambling advertising at the University of Bristol, says that during games, viewers are ‘bombarded just by the sheer appearance of logos around the playing surface.’ (Lauren Sproule/CBC)
Companies like FanDuel have apps where users can sign up to place bets on a variety of sports or play virtual slot machines. iGaming Ontario takes a share of the money made by operators through these activities.
Deirdre Querney, an addiction counsellor at Alcohol, Drug & Gambling Services in Hamilton, Ont., has seen a rise in calls for help since the launch of Ontario’s regulated market.
“A lot of folks are complaining about the increase in advertising,” Querney said. “It’s like they can’t watch a hockey game or football game without constantly being reminded of opportunities to gamble.”
Around 93 per cent of the gambling ads that were documented during the study were imprinted on the court, ice or boards of the sporting venue, either digitally or directly on the surface, as seen in this screen grab from the Oct. 27 NBA game between the Chicago Bulls and Toronto Raptors. (TSN)
For Noah Vineberg, who is recovering from a gambling addiction and is a lifelong sports fan, avoiding gambling advertisements is impossible. The onslaught constantly threatens to trigger him to gamble again.
“It’d be a blatant lie to say it didn’t,” he said.
Noah Vineberg has spent the last five years recovering from a gambling addiction. He says ‘the relapses would have been far quicker’ if the volume of gambling advertisements had been at its current level when he was initially trying to stop gambling. (John Lesavage/CBC News)
Querney describes a shift in recent years, from people trying to control their betting habits in physical casinos to struggling with the pull of internet gambling.
“All of a sudden, you have something completely different — often younger men sports betting online,” she said.
FanDuel did not provide a comment to Marketplace about the ubiquity of its advertising messages, and deferred to the Canadian Gaming Association for a response. Paul Burns, the CEO of the CGA, which represents many gambling operators in Canada, noted that FanDuel is “a large brand and very popular in the marketplace.”
This screen grab shows an NHL game from Oct. 28, 2023, between the New York Rangers and the Vancouver Canucks, and provides examples of advertisements for gambling companies that the researchers were looking at during their analysis. (Sportsnet)
He said gambling messages are “part of branding and advertising” and that FanDuel advertises “within the scope of the leagues and the broadcast partners who set the parameters around what’s permitted.”
Burns said he did not find the overall number of messages to be unreasonable, and argued it’s no different than the advertising practices of other industries.
“This is a legal, regulated industry,” he said. “There’s a high level of oversight.”
Responsible gambling
The Alcohol and Gaming Commission of Ontario (AGCO) stipulates that advertising should contain a responsible gambling message “where effective.”
Wheaton and his research team found that fewer than three per cent of the gambling messages they saw during the NHL/NBA games in the study contained reminders that you must be 19 or older to gamble or directed viewers to resources to help with problem gambling.
Burns said operators in Ontario are now required to hit “a minimum level of spend on responsible gaming,” a policy he said they put in place after the first year of the regulated market. He said we will start seeing those changes soon.
“The gaming industry knows people have control issues with our products,” Burns said. “There’s always more we can do, and we will continue to do that.”
Wheaton reviewed Ontario’s gambling regulations as they pertained to the games he and his team studied. He says the regulations are “ineffective at regulating the current volume … of advertising.”
Several of the gambling brands regulated in Ontario have been using celebrities and athletes in their advertising. Sports Interaction, for example, features NHL players Leon Draisaitl and Mitch Marner in a commercial promoting the company’s online sportsbook.
Paul Burns, the CEO of the Canadian Gaming Association, says there are ‘lots of controls and oversight’ when it comes to the content of gambling advertising. (John Lesavage/CBC)
Marketplace reached out to the leagues and broadcasters, but received no official comment from the NBA or NHL.
CBC, which aired two of the Hockey Night in Canada games included in the analysis, said Rogers Sportsnet holds the national NHL rights and controls the advertising.
In a statement to Marketplace, Rogers Sports & Media, which owns Sportsnet, said the AGCO reviews and approves all sports betting-related ads that air on their TV channels. “We want our viewers to enjoy sports betting safely and responsibly and we use some of our airtime to share messages about responsible gaming and how to get help if needed.”
Bell Media, which owns TSN, also said they follow the standards set out by the regulator and added that “responsible gaming is a key element of TSN’s approach to sports betting content.”
One stakeholder, who did not want to be named, told Marketplace that the findings appear to be overstated, and that counting each logo is not the right way to think about how you limit advertising overexposure in this space.
As a result of public pressure from various groups — including mental health and responsible gambling advocates — the AGCO will ban the use of athletes in gambling ads starting in February, unless they’re promoting a responsible gambling message.
Giesler says this is a start.
“Detaching athletes from gambling marketing is an important first step,” he said. “It’s not the only step.”
Wheaton says this will do little to address the volume of gambling messages, including the ones imposed directly on the rink or court.
Should gambling messages during sports broadcasts be limited?
A new study from CBC’s Marketplace and researchers in the U.K. finds that sports fans are exposed to gambling advertisements about three times a minute during a sports broadcast.
In a statement to Marketplace, the AGCO said it has “significant advertising rules for igaming operators to ensure ad content is truthful and responsible” and added that “advertising has played a key role in addressing one of the government’s important goals, which is to shift gambling to regulated sites that meet high standards of player protection and block access to minors.”
Vineberg, who still watches sports, has developed strategies to try and avoid these advertisements. They include starting up a conversation with someone about something unrelated when the commercials are on or taking his dog for a walk during the sponsored segments.
But he acknowledges it’s harder than ever for people with a gambling addiction to avoid the temptation. His advice? Talk about it.
“I texted my wife every single time that I either thought about [gambling] or was tempted,” Vineberg said. “It really helped for me.”
MONTREAL – Travel company Transat AT Inc. reported a loss in its latest quarter compared with a profit a year earlier as its revenue edged lower.
The parent company of Air Transat says it lost $39.9 million or $1.03 per diluted share in its quarter ended July 31.
The result compared with a profit of $57.3 million or $1.49 per diluted share a year earlier.
Revenue in what was the company’s third quarter totalled $736.2 million, down from $746.3 million in the same quarter last year.
On an adjusted basis, Transat says it lost $1.10 per share in its latest quarter compared with an adjusted profit of $1.10 per share a year earlier.
Transat chief executive Annick Guérard says demand for leisure travel remains healthy, as evidenced by higher traffic, but consumers are increasingly price conscious given the current economic uncertainty.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 12, 2024.
Dollarama Inc.’s food aisles may have expanded far beyond sweet treats or piles of gum by the checkout counter in recent years, but its chief executive maintains his company is “not in the grocery business,” even if it’s keeping an eye on the sector.
“It’s just one small part of our store,” Neil Rossy told analysts on a Wednesday call, where he was questioned about the company’s food merchandise and rivals playing in the same space.
“We will keep an eye on all retailers — like all retailers keep an eye on us — to make sure that we’re competitive and we understand what’s out there.”
Over the last decade and as consumers have more recently sought deals, Dollarama’s food merchandise has expanded to include bread and pantry staples like cereal, rice and pasta sold at prices on par or below supermarkets.
However, the competition in the discount segment of the market Dollarama operates in intensified recently when the country’s biggest grocery chain began piloting a new ultra-discount store.
The No Name stores being tested by Loblaw Cos. Ltd. in Windsor, St. Catharines and Brockville, Ont., are billed as 20 per cent cheaper than discount retail competitors including No Frills. The grocery giant is able to offer such cost savings by relying on a smaller store footprint, fewer chilled products and a hearty range of No Name merchandise.
Though Rossy brushed off notions that his company is a supermarket challenger, grocers aren’t off his radar.
“All retailers in Canada are realistic about the fact that everyone is everyone’s competition on any given item or category,” he said.
Rossy declined to reveal how much of the chain’s sales would overlap with Loblaw or the food category, arguing the vast variety of items Dollarama sells is its strength rather than its grocery products alone.
“What makes Dollarama Dollarama is a very wide assortment of different departments that somewhat represent the old five-and-dime local convenience store,” he said.
The breadth of Dollarama’s offerings helped carry the company to a second-quarter profit of $285.9 million, up from $245.8 million in the same quarter last year as its sales rose 7.4 per cent.
The retailer said Wednesday the profit amounted to $1.02 per diluted share for the 13-week period ended July 28, up from 86 cents per diluted share a year earlier.
The period the quarter covers includes the start of summer, when Rossy said the weather was “terrible.”
“The weather got slightly better towards the end of the summer and our sales certainly increased, but not enough to make up for the season’s horrible start,” he said.
Sales totalled $1.56 billion for the quarter, up from $1.46 billion in the same quarter last year.
Comparable store sales, a key metric for retailers, increased 4.7 per cent, while the average transaction was down2.2 per cent and traffic was up seven per cent, RBC analyst Irene Nattel pointed out.
She told investors in a note that the numbers reflect “solid demand as cautious consumers focus on core consumables and everyday essentials.”
Analysts have attributed such behaviour to interest rates that have been slow to drop and high prices of key consumer goods, which are weighing on household budgets.
To cope, many Canadians have spent more time seeking deals, trading down to more affordable brands and forgoing small luxuries they would treat themselves to in better economic times.
“When people feel squeezed, they tend to shy away from discretionary, focus on the basics,” Rossy said. “When people are feeling good about their wallet, they tend to be more lax about the basics and more willing to spend on discretionary.”
The current economic situation has drawn in not just the average Canadian looking to save a buck or two, but also wealthier consumers.
“When the entire economy is feeling slightly squeezed, we get more consumers who might not have to or want to shop at a Dollarama generally or who enjoy shopping at a Dollarama but have the luxury of not having to worry about the price in some other store that they happen to be standing in that has those goods,” Rossy said.
“Well, when times are tougher, they’ll consider the extra five minutes to go to the store next door.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 11, 2024.
TORONTO – The U.S. Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has ordered TD Bank Group to pay US$28 million for repeatedly sharing inaccurate, negative information about its customers to consumer reporting companies.
The agency says TD has to pay US$7.76 million in total to tens of thousands of victims of its illegal actions, along with a US$20 million civil penalty.
It says TD shared information that contained systemic errors about credit card and bank deposit accounts to consumer reporting companies, which can include credit reports as well as screening reports for tenants and employees and other background checks.
CFPB director Rohit Chopra says in a statement that TD threatened the consumer reports of customers with fraudulent information then “barely lifted a finger to fix it,” and that regulators will need to “focus major attention” on TD Bank to change its course.
TD says in a statement it self-identified these issues and proactively worked to improve its practices, and that it is committed to delivering on its responsibilities to its customers.
The bank also faces scrutiny in the U.S. over its anti-money laundering program where it expects to pay more than US$3 billion in monetary penalties to resolve.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 11, 2024.
