Eastern Bank joins high-stakes Super Bowl ad fray

Eastern Bank is betting on the Super Bowl but not on who wins or loses.

The Boston bank, which has more than 70 branches and reports $6 billion in assets, will kick off its new marketing campaign, "True Blue," with a series of commercials before, during, and after Sunday's big football game on WBZ-TV Channel 4.

The bank is taking what some say is an expensive risk by airing a commercial during a time slot that commands the highest TV advertising rates. But if the ad is well received, it could pay big dividends by delivering the bank's message to the 2 million people WBZ estimates will be watching locally.

Neither the bank nor WBZ disclosed the cost of airing a commercial during the game. But media buyers pegged it at $150,000 per 30-second slot for a local spot, compared with between $5,000 and $7,000 for a prime-time commercial on a typical night, and between $20,000 and $30,000 for ad time during a regular season Patriots game.

That's a bargain compared with what major advertisers are spending for national airtime -- which trade publication Advertising Age pegs at $2.6 million for 30 seconds -- but still more than Eastern Bank has ever spent on a commercial.

"It is worthy of an investment in Super Bowl Sunday," said Joe Bartolotta , Eastern's spokesman. "As expensive as it is, it's a powerful way of launching something and reaching a good portion of your target audience all in the same day."

It's also an investment that could backfire, media buyers said. In joining the Super Bowl fray, Eastern is putting its commercial up against those that cost millions to make and have been designed for maximum entertainment value. And though the bank's spot is running only locally, fans won't necessarily be aware of that as it airs among the big national ads (think Anheuser-Busch Co.) that will surround it on Sunday.

"You might look painfully out of place," said Ellen Comley , executive vice president and managing director at MPG-Arnold , the media buying division of Arnold, a Boston advertising agency.

"We absolutely have clients who opt to stay away from the Super Bowl because it's too much of a showcase," she added. "There's always bombs."

Eastern Bank's 60-second commercial is far from the outrageous or even intentionally corny-but-funny fare common to Super Bowl commercials. The "True Blue" tagline replaces the bank's "This is Our Territory" motto and aims to use its corporate color to create a sense of trust among current and prospective customers.

In the commercial, a lightly strummed guitar plays as a narrator with a soothing baritone equates the color blue with iconic images from Massachusetts geography and history.

"It's the color of a Plymouth Pilgrim and a Brockton boxer," he intones, as the image on the screen flips from a man carrying straw across a Plymouth beach to boxing great Rocky Marciano hitting a speed bag. The ad also features images of NFL quarterback Doug Flutie, a Boston -area native and the bank's celebrity spokesman, and Dick and Rick Hoyt, the sexagenarian father and quadriplegic son from Massachusetts who run marathons together.

Boston ad agency Conover Tuttle Pace created the spot. The campaign is the most expensive ever for Eastern Bank, both in terms of the cost to produce and the cost of TV airtime, Bartolotta said. The bank's last TV ad campaign ended in October .

Eastern wants the marketing effort to hit the broadest possible pool of working professionals, aged 27 to "people nearing retirement." By buying ad time during the Super Bowl, the bank has a much better shot at that than it would if it advertised on any other night.

Eastern Bank also plans to air one commercial before the game and two commercials during the newscast that immediately follows the Super Bowl. On an average Sunday, about 325,000 people tune in to WBZ between 7 p.m. and 11 p.m. , said Ro Dooley Webster , the station's spokeswoman. That's respectable for a Sunday in Boston television, but well short of the number expected to watch the Super Bowl.

And though Eastern is paying more than it ever has for TV airtime, it's a deal compared to what it would have had to pay if the New England Patriots had beaten the Indianapolis Colts to advance to the big game.

Advertising Age reported this week that Chicago's CBS affiliate is charging the highest local rates at $300,000 per 30-second slot during the Super Bowl -- or roughly twice the Boston rate. Viewership is expected to be highest in the hometowns of the two Super Bowl teams, the Chicago Bears and Indianapolis Colts.

Keith Reed can be reached at reed@globe.com.