Peyton Manning wants you to drink Budweiser, too
After winning the Super Bowl on Sunday night, perhaps his last game before retiring as one of football’s most accomplished quarterbacks, Denver Broncos quarterback Peyton Manning said — not once, but twice — that he plans to drink a lot of Budweiser in celebration.
“I want to go kiss my wife and my kids. I want to go, you know, hug my family. And I’m going to drink a lot of Budweiser, Tracy, I promise you that,” Manning said to CBS reporter Tracy Wolfson as confetti fluttered from the sky.
Manning later reiterated the same
“DOES IT HELP BUDWEISER? ABSOLUTELY. I THINK THEY GET MORE VALUE FROM THAT THAN THE ADS. … WE MIGHT BE SEEING A PEYTON MANNING
BUD AD VERY SOON.”
message from the podium after triumphing over Cam Newton and the Carolina Panthers. The NFL’s top pitchman shilling for Budweiser prompted speculation on social media as to whether Manning was paid. The answer: Not exactly, but Manning’s shoutout was nonetheless a savvy business move.
“Hi Internet. For the record, Budweiser did not pay Peyton Manning to mention Budweiser tonight. We were surprised and delighted that he did,” said Lisa Weser, spokeswoman for Anheuser-Busch InBev, on Twitter.
But Manning does own a financial stake in two Anheuser-Busch distributorships, a fact confirmed by Harry Schuhmacher, publisher of respected trade publication Beer Business Daily. And Manning’s done this before: After the 2014 AFC Championship game, Manning pined aloud for a Bud Light at the postgame presser.
Dan Azzaro, senior lecturer in the advertising program at DePaul University College of Communication, called Manning’s post- Super Bowl remarks a “huge win” for Anheuser- Busch and possibly a bridge to a Budweiser endorsement deal for Manning.
“Does it help Budweiser? Absolutely,”
– DAN AZZARO
Azzaro said Monday. “I think they get more value from that than the ads. … We might be seeing a Peyton Manning Bud ad very soon.”
Manning, also a franchise owner of 25 Papa John’s pizza restaurants in Colorado, was listed as this year’s top NFL player in endorsements, with deals valued at about $ 12 million, according to Forbes.
( Manning, who was all- time leading passer with 11,201 yards while a quarterback at the University of Tennessee in the 1990s, bought a home on Chickamauga Lake in Harrison for $800,000 in 2003 when he was playing at the time for the Indianapolis Colts. Last year, Manning joined with former Chattanooga Mayor and U.S. Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., to help raise more than $ 1 million for the Chattanooga Heroes Fund to help the families of the five military officers killed at a Navy recruiting station in Chattanooga.)
For what it’s worth at the end of Sunday’s Superbowl victory, Manning embraced Papa John’s founder John Schnatter on the football field immediately after the game. Pizza and beer just go together.
All in all, it amounted to a good night for Anheuser- Busch, which also scored with a commercial featuring actress Helen Mirren, who spoke frankly on the idiocy of driving drunk before she hoisted a Budweiser.
Who knew Manning and Mirren had so much in common?