movies prove TV is best

Shit. I’ve barely been in LA a week and I’m already on my third US-related post.

Whatevs…

I was walking past a hunormous poster for Guardians of the Galaxy this morning…

Giant Guardians of Galaxy billboard sunset strip

…when it occurred to me, for the umpteenth time, that these things must cost a lot of money to make, then even more money to own the poster site for a few weeks. I continued to wonder how that price, for a single site in a single city in a country of 320m people, balances out with the potential income for that movie.

Then, as luck would have it, my musings were answered a few hours later with a handy article from the Hollywood Reporter.

For those of you too busy to read it, the gist is that marketing costs for a big Hollywood movie are pushing $100m in the US, and another $100m for the rest of the world.

That seems crazy, particularly as the movie itself is unlikely to cost that much. It also seems crazy because ‘in 1980, the average cost of marketing a studio movie in the U.S. was $4.3 million ($12.4 million in today’s dollars). By 2007, it had shot up to nearly $36 million. If the MPAA still tracked spending on Prints & Advertising, that number would be north of $40 million today for medium-size films like The Fault in Our Stars or Tammy.’

So WTF?

Well, apparently the main culprit for this is the cost of TV advertising, which has risen enormously in recent years. But, you might ask, with so many more reasonably-priced and better-targeted media choices out there, why not use the other methods and save a few bob?

Interesting question. According to the article and the stats, only TV has the massive reach that these mass-market behemoths need. So far from being dead in any way, TV is the medium the tight, tight bastards of Hollywood will pour hundreds of millions into because no other channel can blast out a gigantic message like it..

If that’s contrary to anything you’ve heard over the last few years, then drink in this delicious proof that TV is the biggest and best medium to communicate a message. If you can afford it, and your target is wide enough to justify it, there is literally no website, social media whatsit or DM thingie that can compete.