National Football League

Super Bowls ads selling for more than $4 million

Published Jan. 8, 2013 9:49 p.m. ET

foxsports

Super Bowl ads have sold for more than $4 million for some 30-second spots for this year's game.

All the commercials for the NFL championship Feb. 3 in New Orleans are sold out, CBS Corp. CEO Leslie Moonves said Tuesday.

Companies paid an average of $3.5 million for a 30-second spot last year, the previous record for a number that keeps going up. TV's biggest event averaged more than 111 million viewers in 2012.

For CBS, the entire company is taking part in promoting the Super Bowl. The network's telecasts will be headquartered in New Orleans' Jackson Square. The sets will be used by 15 different shows from nine CBS divisions, from the main network to cable channels to online to radio.

''We've never done anything like this before,'' CBS Sports Chairman Sean McManus said.

That list includes the daytime show ''The Talk,'' which will broadcast from the city the week leading up to the game to try to take advantage of the Super Bowl's large female viewership.

The Jackson Square shoots will give CBS plenty of opportunities to highlight New Orleans' recovery from Hurricane Katrina as the city hosts its first Super Bowl since the storm. Its coverage will include a special called ''New Orleans: Let The Good Times Roll'' hosted by musician Wynton Marsalis airing at noon on Super Bowl Sunday.

The halftime show will be by Beyonce. Moonves joked: ''I actually wanted Janet Jackson.''

The last time a female pop star performed at the half of a Super Bowl on CBS, Jackson had her breast-baring ''wardrobe malfunction'' in 2004. Moonves can laugh about it now, after the Supreme Court decided last summer not to consider reinstating the government's $550,000 fine on the network.