AdAge Megabrands

According to Advertising Age, Verizon was the biggest spender on advertising in 2004, dropping $1,505,900,000 on “Can you hear me now?” and other great culture-advancing fare. That didn’t amaze me given the ubiquity of the guy with the goofy uniform and glasses. What did amaze me was the distance from #1 to #2, with Ford Motor Co. spending $948,000,000, a differential of more than half a billion dollars.

Even though all parties involved (customers, employees, shareholders) appear to have taken it in the shorts, the deregulation of telecommunications actually did have a winner. TV, newspapers and magazines are overflowing with cash from Verizon, Cingular and the rest. Telecoms spent over $5 billion in 2004, nearly $2 billion more than the pharmaceutical brands, and more than three times the combined spending on beer and cola.