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Suds under assault
By The Associated Press
College sports soaked in beer commercials, says group
WASHINGTON A consumer group known for criticizing the fat in things like
movie theater popcorn, fast food and pizza has a new target alcohol
advertising in college sports and has enlisted a pair of famous former
coaches as allies.
The Center for Science in the Public Interest kicked off a campaign
Wednesday aimed at getting colleges and universities, athletic conferences
and the NCAA to stop taking money from alcohol advertisers.
George Hacker, director of the CSPI's alcohol policies project, said college
administrators who are trying to cut down on underage drinking on campus
can't look the other way when it comes to beer ads during televised college
sports games.
"University officials are selling their students and other young fans to
beer marketers, and at the same time their greatest concern on campus is
alcohol problems," Hacker said. "They lose a great deal of credibility."
Helping kick off the campaign were former University of North Carolina head
basketball coach Dean Smith college basketball's all-time winningest coach
and Rep. Tom Osborne, R-Neb., former University of Nebraska head football
coach.
Hacker charged that beer marketers are clearly targeting underage drinkers,
a point the alcohol industry disputed.
"The fact is that the vast majority of those persons that watch and attend
college sports, as well as the majority of students in college, are of legal
drinking age, 21 or older," said Jeff Becker, president of the Beer
Institute, a trade association.
The CSPI said alcohol producers spent nearly $600 million on sports
programming in 2002. Of that, nearly $60 million was spent on college sports
programs, funding more than 6,200 ads.
Hacker said the NCAA basketball tournament in 2002 had 939 beer ads, more
than the Super Bowl, World Series, college football bowl games and NFL
Monday Night Football combined.
©2003 The Associated Press. Bonesville.net contributed to this report. All rights reserved.
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02.23.07 10:36 AM
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