The impact of the Corona crisis in Belgium is unprecedented. Especially for the local brands and the small businesses. Because paradoxically, in any crisis, companies need to invest to survive. Unfortunately, it’s the big dogs, the multinationals that have the capacity and the buffer to do so. And the smaller local brands, they don’t. So, local businesses will have a huge problem to survive. A wave of bankruptcies is expected. As a matter of fact, by the end of 2020, 40% of all Belgian local businesses are at risk of disappearing. So, helping out local brands in times of crisis is not an act of protectionism, it’s an act of survival.

The biggest national TV channel is ‘channel 4’, one of the TV channels that is part of Belgium’s biggest broadcaster SBS. In peak time, 75% of the population is watching the most popular commercial break of channel 4, on a daily basis. 85% of those people watching are the ‘responsible of purchase’, between 18 and 45 years old. Even more, this daily media peak time window on channel 4 is responsible for 65% of all media buying in Belgium. So, as you can imagine, these breaks are extremely valuable and the best way for brands to seen and bought.

And it is exactly those most valuable breaks that were turned into ‘Belgian commercial breaks’, showcasing nothing but Belgian brands.

March 18th 2020 is when the first Belgian lockdown started. Barely three weeks later SBS managed to turn its daily most valuable commercial break on Channel 4 into ‘Belgian commercial breaks’, with nothing but local brands. And this during the entire lockdown, till May 18th. Every ‘Belgian commercial break’ consisted of 7 to 10 different paid local ads. Resulting in 184 different local brands advertised! Once everything went back to normal, the ‘Belgian commercial break’ stopped. This being said, Belgium is back in lockdown, so the Belgian commercial break will be re-installed. And since SBS is an international broadcaster, they are also preparing to import the ‘Belgian commercial break’ in the Netherland, France, etc.

83% of the population saw the ‘Belgian commercial break’ and at a time when a lot of local advertisers were cancelling their media buy, SBS and the ‘Belgian Commercial Break’ managed to increase the number of Belgian advertisers by 126%. But there’s more: 83% of the ‘responsible for purchase’ found the initiative very useful (source Ipsos) and 45% of them indicated the ‘Belgian commercial break’ as the incentive to buy Belgian (source Ipsos). Another striking result: there was 25% less channel surfing compared to other commercial breaks (source CIM tv Belgium). With another lockdown hitting Europe, the ‘Belgian commercial break’ is now ready to also become ‘The Dutch break’, ‘The French break’, etc.