Youth Exposure to Alcohol Advertising on Television, 2001 to 2007

The Center on Alcohol Marketing and Youth commissioned Virtual Media Resources (VMR) to analyze all alcohol advertising on television from 2001 through 2007. VMR is a media research, planning, market analysis and consulting firm based in Natick, Massachusetts, serving communications organizations and marketers in a wide variety of market segments and media. VMR was established in 1992 to provide an independent research firm serving advertising agencies and has grown to service over 100 clients across the United States and Canada in retail, publishing, financial, automotive, public health and other fields. VMR has received no funding from alcohol or tobacco marketers.

This report is based on industry-standard data sources and methods that are available to ad agencies and advertisers as they make their decisions about where to place their advertising.

This report analyzes alcohol product and “responsibility” advertising. VMR staff viewed all commercials to ensure that they were appropriately classified by type as corporate, event, “responsibility” or product advertisements. This report does not include alcohol advertising bought directly on local cable systems or cable interconnects, because the standard industry sources licensed for this report do not include these data; such advertising may appear on cable stations that are delivered via cable television. Because distilled spirits advertisers, faced with a voluntary ban on their advertising by the four major broadcast networks, have made particular use of local cable channels, this report may understate their presence on television. The report also does not include advertising data from Spanish-language television networks, such as Univision and Telemundo.