If you watch sport, it is impossible to avoid ads for the sports betting apps - with Sportsbet the biggest player of them all.
From its Elite Average Games campaign on screens, to the infamous 'Manscaping' ad that website Ad Standards said was the most complained about in the last decade, Sportsbet are an in-your-face brand that appears as Aussie as a kangaroo.
In 2020, it spent an estimated $139.3m on advertising and sponsorship, over $60million more than its nearest competitor, bombarding airwaves with ads that depict a larrikin Aussie image that combines humour with online punting.
That includes its integration into networks' sport broadcasts, as program hosts throw to gambling experts (usually ex-football players such as Nathan Brown and Joel Caine) for the live odds.
Even Nick Kyrgios' brother Christos turned into an ad for the brand at the 2018 Australian Open, for which he was reportedly paid $40,000.
Sportsbet's ads have frequently caused a stir. In 2017, for example, an ad featuring Canadian sprinted Ben Johnson, which carried the tagline 'Put the 'roid in Android', was banned by the Advertising Standards Board because it made light of the use of performance enhancing drugs in sport.
In 2020, Sportsbet spent an estimated $139.3m on advertising and sponsorship, over $60million more than its nearest competitor
Sportsbet is owned by Dublin-based Flutter, a $50billion betting giant listed on the London stock exchange that also owns Betfair, PokerStars, FanDuel and Paddy Power
Other brands such as Ladbrokes, Bet365 and Neds have followed suit, attempting to engage new and existing punters with a blokey, humorous, entertainment-driven image.
Ladbrokes even imported Hollywood star Mark Wahlberg for its latest campaign, while NBA legend Shaquille O'Neal utters Aussie phrases such as 'I just threw a pineapple on a roughie at Randwick' as Australian brand ambassador for Pointsbet.
'US sports, particularly professional basketball, continue to be the fastest-growing betting sport in Australia, and we are very excited to align with such a transcendent athlete,' Pointsbet co-founder Andrew Fahey said of Shaq's signing.
It's Sportsbet, however, that is now the largest online-only bookmaker in Australia, capturing 42.6 per cent of the market by mid-2021 (up from 30,3 per cent in 2019). It grew again last year after a merger with BetEasy in May 2020.
'We are passionate about being an iconic Aussie brand that’ll bring excitement to life for generations to come,' its website states.
However Sportsbet is anything but an Australian operation.
Look global, act localStephen Ferguson, the CEO of the Australian Hotels Association, an organisation that has regularly argued online betting agencies don't operate on a level playing field, said many of the online 'corporate bookmakers' like Sportsbet are not what they seem.
'It is fair to say that jokey Australian image is not the reality of the companies,' he said.
Instead, Sportsbet is owned by Dublin-based Flutter, a $50billion betting giant listed on the London stock exchange that also owns Betfair, PokerStars, FanDuel and Paddy Power.
'The biggest companies are domiciled offshore, they shift all their profits offshore,' Mr Ferguson said.
'It’s a bit of a giveaway that their licences aren’t held in the major jurisdictions where they actually take bets.
'In the case of Australia they’re often licensed in places like Gibraltar, the Isle of Jersey, the Isle of Guernsey, the Northern Territory, Norfolk Island at one stage... none of which have much wagering product.'
Sportsbet is considered the 'stand-out performer' in Flutter's global portfolio, accounting for close to a third of the outfit's operating profit.
And yet it only employs about 700 people in Australia, representing just five per cent of its total international workforce of 14,500. While licensed in Darwin, most of its Australian staff work from headquarters in Melbourne.
Covid has accelerated the online gambling industry. Pubs and other venues closed by rolling lockdowns has presented keen gamblers with little option but to open an online account.
'It's been happening for a decade anyway but what Covid has done is speed up the the migration from the more traditional wagering formats to the new ones,' an industry source said.
Nick Kyrgios' brother Christos turned into an ad for the brand at the 2018 Australian Open, for which he was reportedly paid $40,000
Australian Hotels Association CEO Stephen Ferguson said more beneficial tax rates for online betting agencies makes it easier for them to compete for customers. 'They’re out after our customers and we don’t like that. It’s not a level playing field'
SportsBet is now the largest online-only betting site in Australia, building its 'entertainment' brand on growth in users of about 10 per cent a year.
A market presentation by the brand for investors, seen by Daily Mail Australia, claims one in four Australians aged 18-34 now has a Sportsbet account.
Its profit for the first half of 2021 jumped by 66 per cent to more than A$350m.
According to Flutter's 2020
