Capitol Ad Watch

By Philip Bunnell

This Week’s Winner: General Electric with 13 ads

This Week’s Honorable Mention: The Defense Industry with 15 ads (6 from GE)

Last week’s Capitol Hill publications saw a sharp rise in advertisements from the defense industry, with a blitzkrieg of public relations campaigns from Lockheed Martin, Sierra Nevada, and Boeing among others.

The increase in defense ads corresponded with Memorial Day weekend and proposed cuts to the defense budget by several Congressional leaders.  Budget battles are sure to ensue when it comes time to decide which projects to slash.

General Electric and Rolls-Royce released a joint advertisement defending the F136 engine, which the ad says is 80% complete and does not require any more funding.  Lockheed Martin took out several ads to defend the F-35 fighter jet, a target of budget cutters who have expressed alarm over the steadily rising price tag on the project.  The Sierra Nevada Corporation also bought ad space to push their A-29 Super Tucano jet.  Raytheon had an ad supporting its missile defense system showing the Patriot defense system with the caption “most capable air and missile defense system,” and an empty field with the caption “its closest competitor.”

Many of the ads taken by defense companies were focused on honoring America’s armed forces in the lead up to Memorial Day and were found in special Memorial Day sections in the respective publications.

Besides defense, wireless communications had another good showing with many spreads and full page ads from AT&T, Verizon, Sprint, and Light Squared.  These all come in the wake of the AT&T merger with T-Mobile.

Energy companies also did well, with ads from the American Petroleum Institute decrying proposed repeals of tax breaks for oil companies, and ads from the Nuclear Energy Institute defending nuclear energy as a safe alternative to fossil fuels.