Radio-Canada is preparing for another edition of “Bye bye de la pub,” a competition to see which brand sits at the top of one of the year’s biggest audience event in Quebec.

Bye bye is a long-running sketch comedy show that satirizes the year’s biggest cultural, social and political moments during its annual New Year’s Eve broadcast. It regularly pulls in millions of viewers and is an opportunity for advertisers to reach the French-language market’s biggest audience of the year. Last year’s broadcast reached nearly 3.8 million viewers, an increase of 200,000.

That viewership has made the broadcast an advertiser event on par with major award shows and sporting events, with many brands often creating new ads for the show. Ad inventory sold out over the summer, rather than the fall, as it had in past years.

But that doesn’t mean advertiser opportunities are all wrapped up. For the fifth year, Radio-Canada will be running “Bye bye de la pub,” a contest voted on by viewers to select their favourite ad of the night. On top of bragging rights, the advertiser gets $75,000 in media visibility from Radio-Canada.

Last year, Radio-Canada was hoping to see more national and even English-language advertisers take part in the contest as a way to forge deeper connections with Quebec consumers.

The 2021 edition of the contest was won by Lg2, for an ad it created for pet retailer Mondou.