Americans Will Eat More Than 1.3 Billion Chicken Wings on Super Bowl Sunday

super bowl chicken wings
Shutterstock

It's almost time for the national celebration of commercials, cheap beer, and delicious artery-clogging foodstuffs piled on paper plates. Oh, and football, if you can pull yourself away from the Puppy Bowl. It's Super Bowl time and the obvious way to celebrate a day dedicated to watching people at their physical peak push themselves to the limit is scrapping greasy chicken meat off a bone with your teeth and clogging your mouth hole with potato chips. And that's exactly what Americans are going to do.

Everyone knows that the Super Bowl pulls in massive ratings and it costs millions to run a national ad during the game. But the most shocking statistic about Super Bowl Sunday might be poultry related. The fowl fact is Americans are expected to eat 1.33 billion chicken wings over the weekend, according to the National Chicken Council. Despite their name, that organization is not run by chickens. You can tell, because the National Council of Chickens press release simply reads, "NO! NO! NO! NO! NO! NO! OH, GOD NO!"

The poultry fact is shocking, but it runs across food preferences. Americans eat more food on Super Bowl Sunday than any other day of the year, save Thanksgiving, according to the USDA. For instance, a report at Forbes, says RetailMeNot.com estimates that 12.5 million pizzas will be consumed Sunday. That's a lot of pizza, but oh my god, did you hear that Americans are going to eat 1.33 billion chicken wings?

Let that sink in. 1.33 billion chicken wings. That's 166.25 million pounds of chicken wings.

If those numbers are too abstract, the National Chicken Council laid some informational eggs to help you understand how many wings that is if you only understand food based on how long it is. If you laid 1.33 billion chicken wings end-to-end you can lay them back and forth between Boston and Atlanta — home of the two teams competing in this year's Super Bowl — 80 times. Or if that's still too abstract, you can lay those wings around the circumference of the Earth almost three times. Now you get it.

On the upside, the number of chickens sacrificed for football's Christmas does signify that in divisive times, Americans can still find common ground. Everyone loves delicious, buffalo-ed up chicken wings. Sorry, PETA.

h/t Forbes

Sign up here for our daily Thrillist email, and get your fix of the best in food/drink/fun.

Dustin Nelson is a News Writer with Thrillist. He holds a Guinness World Record but has never met the fingernail lady. He’s written for Sports Illustrated, Rolling Stone, Men’s Journal, The Rumpus, and other digital wonderlands. Follow him @dlukenelson.
Sign up for Before You Go
Thanks for signing up!
Unlock the latest and greatest travel news each week, including hacks, deals, and myth-busters to guide your next adventure.
We'll see you in your inbox.
By signing up, I agree to the Terms and Privacy Policy.

Related