NBC’s Plans for Liquor Ads Have Dried Up

Fearing congressional scrutiny, General Electric’s NBC television network said Wednesday that it will stop accepting advertisements for hard liquor, returning to network television’s 54-year-old practice of abstaining from such ads.

After thinking it through, NBC executives realized that the company had more to lose in breaking this taboo than it had to gain. In December, NBC broke ranks with CBS, ABC and Fox to be the first national broadcast network to run liquor advertising.

NBC said it has limited its liquor company-sponsored messages to about 50 public service announcements promoting responsible drinking that ran after the prime-time hours. The PSAs were a prerequisite NBC demanded of companies interested in running liquor product promotions.

Struggling with the advertising recession, NBC had hoped it could tap more than $100million in new advertising revenue by running ads for hard liquor, according to Jerry McGee, president of the Los Angeles office of J. Walter Thompson advertising agency, which represents liquor companies. With ads for spirits already running on 400 local broadcast stations across the country and 30 national cable networks, NBC wanted a piece of the action.

However, once Congress announced it would hold hearings on the propriety of using the public airways to promote hard liquor, the network realized that ads for all kinds of alcoholic beverages would be called into question. Beer and wine ads currently funnel more than $1 billion in revenue to broadcast networks each year.

“NBC realized it ran a huge risk of actually losing current sources of revenues,” McGee said.

That might have happened. Rep. Edward J. Markey (D-Mass.), ranking Democrat on the House Subcommittee on Telecommunications and the Internet, said he would have applauded such a review. “Had [this] led to a discussion of beer and wine ads, that would have been a good thing,” said Markey, noting alcoholism’s toll on society. “We were attempting to hold the line here.

“I applaud NBC for its decision today to end its experiment.”

Joseph Califano Jr. of Columbia University’s National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse called the decision “an important victory for parents and children across the country.”

The network was criticized for its decision to carry ads for Diageo’s Smirnoff vodka by groups including the American Medical Assn. and Mothers Against Drunk Driving, which had a news conference on alcohol advertising scheduled for today. Diageo said in a statement that it would continue discussions with NBC, but declined to comment further.

Despite the furor over NBC’s plan to accept these commercial spots, ads for distilled spirits such as Brown-Forman Corp.’s Jack Daniels whiskey sold by local stations have appeared for years during high-profile programs such as “The West Wing” and “ER” on NBC and the Super Bowl broadcast on Fox. Local network affiliates, many of them owned by the major networks, have been airing liquor ads since 1996.

The local ads never stirred a fraction of the controversy provoked by the decision of NBC, which is considered a national standard bearer.

NBC acknowledged that congressional pressure had a role in its decision, noting that it decided to drop the ads after a request from the House and Senate Commerce Committee to reconsider the network’s December decision.

“We said we were going to take into account all these various points of view,” said Alan Wurtzel, president NBC standards and research. “We did, and we decided we weren’t going to go forward.”

NBC ultimately decided that the new ads would not be worth the risks.

According to a statement from NBC, the standards for liquor ads were more stringent than for other products.

“We banned any symbol, animation, promotional character or language intended to appeal to minors. NBC prohibited drinking in the ads, glamorization of alcohol, and any suggestion that drinking is a rite of passage or that distilled spirits will enhance anyone’s attractiveness, personal relationships or sexual prowess.”

The Distilled Spirits Council, a trade group representing liquor makers, was disappointed by NBC’s decision, charging that the network was caving to pressure from the beer industry--one of the highest-spending advertising sectors.

“They say they buckled under to the critics,” said Frank Coleman, a spokesman for the council. “We say that too, but clearly beer wants the marketplace to itself.”

Shares of General Electric fell fell $1.10 on Wednesday to $38.80 on the New York Stock Exchange.

The announcements were made after the close of regular U.S. trading.

Times news services were used in compiling this report.