Opinion: We must do something about these gambling ads on hockey helmets

Timothy Dewhirst is a professor and senior research fellow in marketing and public policy at the Gordon S. Lang School of Business and Economics at the University of Guelph.

The Edmonton Oilers’ impressive playoff run this season brought heightened attention to the team. When watching the Stanley Cup finals, it became apparent to a broader audience that the helmets of Oilers players – during their home games – featured advertising for Play Alberta.

At first glance, the NHL team’s sponsor might be mistakenly identified as a non-profit, public entity that aims to promote exercise and healthy lifestyles. But Play Alberta is the brand name of the province’s lone sanctioned gambling website.

It’s quite a recent phenomenon. Advertisements first became visible on NHL players’ helmets during the truncated 2020-2021 season. The National Hockey League was looking for ways to offset lost revenue as they felt the brunt of the pandemic.

Further, helmet advertising served as a stepping-stone for advertising appearing on NHL team jerseys, and evidently the game’s ever-increasing commercialization. The home jerseys of the Washington Capitals feature a logo for Caesar’s Sportsbook.

Looking beyond team-level sponsorships, the NHL now includes an astounding number (16) of partners which pertain to sports betting, including BetMGM, FanDuel, Betway, DraftKings, ESPN Bet, Bet365, Bet99, Sports Interaction, and the Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corp. (OLG).

This is a problem. Canadian federal legislation leaves it to provincial and territorial governments to determine how single-event sports betting is regulated. In Ontario, standards now ban the use of athlete endorsers in sports betting advertising owing to their youth appeal. Still, as the Play Alberta partnership with the Oilers shows, stars such as Connor McDavid continue to be associated with betting promotions.

Provincial standards have been unsatisfactory to date, which prompts calls for federal legislation that more rigorously restricts sports betting promotion, including measures that curtail its reach among youth.

Look how successful the Play Alberta helmet ads were.

The Play Alberta website, which is overseen by Alberta Gaming, Liquor and Cannabis (AGLC), launched in 2020. The website’s traffic and usage were at an all-time high during the recent Stanley Cup finals when many Albertans placed bets on the Oilers to win.

As Dan Keene, AGLC’s vice-president of gaming, told the Edmonton Journal: “This run with the NHL playoffs is the largest in terms of activity that we’ve ever seen for Play Alberta in sports.”

Mr. Keene indicated that more than 300,000 Albertans had signed up at Play Alberta during the Stanley Cup finals.

For Play Alberta, “the NHL is always the most active sport on the site … And we are seeing unprecedented betting activity going on right now,” claimed Mr. Keene, referring to the playoff run of the Oilers.

That unprecedented betting activity comes at a cost. The AGLC’s stated mandate is to uphold the integrity of gaming activities while maximizing its financial returns. Yet, maximizing financial returns at Play Alberta comes at the expense of mounting losses among many Albertans who are betting.

Amid those losses are bettors with uncontrollable desires to wager despite the negative consequences of their actions.

The “Gambling Policy Framework” from the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH) – released this year – reveals that gambling is related to a multitude of harms. Adverse outcomes include the possibility of significant financial losses, further contributing to poor mental health, experiencing difficulties with friends and family, and prompting potential criminal activity.

Play Alberta also offered several promotional incentives during the NHL playoffs, including prizes such as ticket giveaways.

Marketing and advertising functions tend to increase overall consumption. And with Play Alberta being the only sanctioned online gambling site offered to Albertans, the role of its marketing activities affecting market share is minimal.

Play Alberta prominently highlights that generated revenue goes toward supporting worthy public initiatives such as education and health care. Largely overlooked in its marketing communication are the harms related to betting and gambling.

Hockey is an important part of Canadian identity. But the plethora of sports betting promotions, when watching our beloved NHL teams in action, has crossed the line and should be considered offside.