Pod Insights Kohler Media Why Are All Our Movies Ads Now? About this episode When we watch a movie we see 4-5 brands every 10 minutes. The advertising is hidden in plain sight and this episode goes looking for where and how that trick first came to Hollywood.
E. T. and a bag of Reese's Pieces, Lois Lane chain smoking Marlboros, Happy Gilmore’s Subway t-shirts… and Jerry McGuire taking Reebok’s money and then screwing them over. All steps on the path to the situation audiences now find themselves in - marketing campaigns dressed up as movies.
All that… plus a two truths and a lie with a twist - one "casual" mention in this very episode was a paid placement.
Check out Cool Shirtz - https://shirtz.cool/
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Transcript 0:00 Speaker 00 I was watching Happy Gilmore on a plane the other day. Absolute all-timer for me. And when I got to the bit where Happy does an ad for Subway, I, I found myself really wanting a Subway. And I think I'm gonna have to get the perspective of our excellent producer, Rob, on this. Rob, hello.
0:17 Speaker 01 Howdy.
0:18 Speaker 00 Do you remember the bit I'm talking about in Happy Gilmore?
0:20 Speaker 01 Yeah, I do.
0:21 Speaker 00 It's a bit, it's a few bits.
0:22 Speaker 01 Yeah.
0:23 Speaker 00 Like, he's wearing a Subway shirt.
0:24 Speaker 01 Yep.
0:24 Speaker 00 He hits the ball, but the ball is a Subway footlong.
0:27 Speaker 01 Yep.
0:27 Speaker 00 It's a whole ad.
0:28 Speaker 01 Yeah.
0:29 Speaker 00 You know the bit I'm talking about?
0:30 Speaker 01 I do.
0:30 Speaker 00 So I looked it up, and sure enough, Subway paid for that.
0:35 Speaker 01 Oh.
0:35 Speaker 00 I know, it's, it's an ad in the movie, but it's still an ad to you and me watching it.
0:41 Speaker 01 Yeah.
0:42 Speaker 00 And it's still an ad to us watching it now.
0:44 Speaker 01 I guess it's a good way to, you know, help the bottom line of doing a film.
0:47 Speaker 00 It is. It's genius. I mean, I saw it the other day and it still works. I still feel fondly about Subway because Happy Gilmore, AKA Adam Sandler, is sprucing it.
1:00 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:01 Speaker 00 Now, we don't know how much Subway paid for that. Those amounts are very rarely disclosed.
1:05 Speaker 01 Hmm.
1:06 Speaker 00 But we do know that when Happy Gilmore 2 happened, only a few years ago, Subway was all over it again.
1:12 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:12 Speaker 00 Key sponsors.
1:13 Speaker 01 Do you think they'd have said, hey, do you wanna footlong meatball sub? And that was enough?
1:16 Speaker 00 Maybe, maybe, maybe it would be if you and I were putting together the movie. But I think for Adam Sandler, a lot of money was changing hands there.
1:26 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:26 Speaker 00 This episode is all about products appearing in TV and movies and other places, and how and where this incredible secret economy came from. The product placement industry is worth something in the ballpark of 33 billion US dollars a year, but those numbers are absolutely not firm because there is hardly any disclosure around this at all. It's a bit of a mystery space. We're gonna have a proper look at this incredibly lucrative world of putting real products into the entertainment that we watch. And of course, as mentioned, Rob, you're here with me. You- Absorb a fair bit of entertainment as well as me.
2:08 Speaker 01 Hmm, I do. I also make it as well. And I'm very familiar with an agency buzz term of brand integration.
2:16 Speaker 00 I.
2:16 Speaker 01 And they love some brand integration. And I feel like the top shelf product placement is the best brand integration you'll get. Where you don't notice it, where it's the movie's finished and you're like, Subway. Do you guys want to get Subway? And you don't know why you're thinking it. That's good brand integration.
2:31 Speaker 00 Have you ever come across a brand integration officer?
2:34 Speaker 01 No.
2:35 Speaker 00 Cause it's a real thing.
2:36 Speaker 01 Oh, man.
2:36 Speaker 00 Maybe it's more of a thing in like the kind of the US.
2:39 Speaker 01 Do they have a badge?
2:41 Speaker 00 Maybe they do.
2:44 Speaker 00 Can you imagine?
2:45 Speaker 01 Excuse me, brand integration.
2:46 Speaker 00 Guys just checking in here, making sure everything's going up to code. Yeah, I mean, it's a massive, massive world and it's, it's kind of pretty quiet.
2:54 Speaker 01 Yep.
2:55 Speaker 00 But it's very, very big and growing all the time. So, welcome to this episode of How We Got Here, Product Placement. We're going to get into it right after this particularly well flagged message from our partners today, Rob.
3:08 Speaker 00 And we've got a very special two truths and a lie segment for you coming up, right on the other side of these messages.
3:16 Speaker 00 The old finance playbook, secure job, property, super and weight is a solid foundation. But these days, it's only part of the story. The team behind IG Markets has 50 years in the industry. They know how it works and they've built something to round it out. IG Markets is the modern complement. Shares, ETFs and crypto, all in one easy to use app. No jumping between platforms, no juggling logins, just more ways to put your money to work, starting with whatever you have right now. IG Markets believes every Australian deserves more ways to grow what they've built. And they're here to help you do exactly that. Search IG Markets or download the app IG Markets. This is new money.
4:01 Speaker 00 Crypto is unregulated and high risk. Investor protections do not apply. IG Digital Assets Australia, P T Y L T D is registered with OzTrak.
4:12 Speaker 00 When was the last time you looked at your home loan? Well, most of us check it about as often as we flip the mattress and your lender's quietly loving that. If it's been a while, Mortgage Choice could help you find a better deal. Firstly, Mortgage Choice gives you more choice, comparing loan options from over 35 lenders. And with more than 1,000 local brokers Australia-wide, expert help is never far away. To get more from your home loan, choose Mortgage Choice. Talk to your local Mortgage Choice broker today.
4:45 Speaker 00 Rob, you don't really know this, you haven't been fully briefed, but I've been cooking up something here. I'm gonna sprinkle three products into this episode.
4:55 Speaker 01 Okay.
4:55 Speaker 00 I'm gonna mention them as naturally as I can.
4:58 Speaker 01 Okay.
4:58 Speaker 00 Two of those mentions are completely organic, as they say.
5:02 Speaker 01 Okay.
5:02 Speaker 00 One of them is part of a deal.
5:06 Speaker 01 Great.
5:07 Speaker 00 So see if you can guess which one of them is the deal placement.
5:12 Speaker 01 I'm excited for this.
5:13 Speaker 00 I'm excited too.
5:14 Speaker 01 Yeah.
5:14 Speaker 00 Something different, I'm gonna see, I'm gonna test myself.
5:16 Speaker 01 Yeah.
5:18 Speaker 00 At the end of the episode, of course, I'll tell you the answer and I'll tell you the terms of that deal as well. I have absolutely no idea if I can pull this off, but we'll find out together.
5:26 Speaker 01 Let's do it.
5:26 Speaker 00 Safe to say.
5:27 Speaker 01 Let's do it.
5:29 Speaker 00 Okay, let's get into the story of where all this product placement really came from. And we start in the early 1930s in the US and soap companies are locked in a battle for market share. Procter and Gamble was the main one, it's still going, it owns Pantene, Tide, Head and Shoulders, Oral-B, heaps of stuff. And they were up against Colgate Palmolive, which is obviously, I mean, that one owns Colgate and Palmolive, along with other things like Ajax and Fabuloso. And interesting, these brands are still going, I mean, I've got Ajax.
6:06 Speaker 01 Oh, yeah.
6:06 Speaker 00 The spray and wipe bottle right here, I brought it in just in case we needed to spray and wipe anything in the studio. I quite like this.
6:12 Speaker 01 Yeah.
6:12 Speaker 00 I use it a bit, I think it smells good.
6:14 Speaker 01 I mean, for disclosure for the listeners, it's the Friday, we're recording this and Friday's usually the day that I clean the office, so maybe we get the Ajax out.
6:21 Speaker 00 Perfect, you wanna get the Ajax out for that. I mean, I didn't know it was gonna be historically significant, but I do quite like that stuff.
6:29 Speaker 00 Look, both of those companies, they're, they're still going today, as I said. At the time, back in the 1930s, they're trying desperately to beat each other and get new market share. Now, Harley Proctor was the son of one of the founders, William Proctor. And he was the head of sales at the time, and he had this idea to use radio to advertise the soap inside entertaining broadcasts. Now, this is a really good idea for two reasons. First, the timing was really good. Radio ownership went from 40% of all American households in 1930 to 90% of all American households in 1940. So, timing was great. 1930s is the time to do this.
7:12 Speaker 00 And the second reason was because the rise of radio happened so fast that programming was still just trying to keep up. Lots of sort of throwing spaghetti at the wall to see what kind of content sticks. And the idea for serialized dramatic shows with characters and ongoing storylines, that was the brainchild of this Harley Proctor at Proctor and Gamble. And he was using it to sell soap. So, he figured out that if you hire writers and actors and you pay for the production, then you can advertise whatever you want, however you want, inside the show. And so, that's what they did. Then Colgate-Palmolive did the same thing.
7:54 Speaker 00 And all of a sudden, you've got really popular scripted radio shows that are being produced by soap companies. And Rob, hence the name Soap Operas.
8:04 Speaker 01 You know, I didn't know that that was why they were called Soap Operas.
8:07 Speaker 00 Neither did I.
8:09 Speaker 01 That's news to me.
8:10 Speaker 00 Isn't it? It's fascinating. And that name stuck in the 1930s, and it's still the reason now. Just because of the advertisers that created the whole thing.
8:19 Speaker 01 It's insane.
8:20 Speaker 00 It's funny, because you'd be listening to these shows, and they'd be dialing up the drama. And then, all of a sudden, a character would be like, you know, I can't believe you've done this. But my goodness, this bar of Proctor and Gamble Ivory Soap makes the suds so quickly and easily.
8:41 Speaker 00 I'm so glad I brought this soap from Proctor and Gamble.
8:44 Speaker 01 Not subtle at all.
8:45 Speaker 00 No, but this is in there like three, five, 10 times a day.
8:51 Speaker 00 And it really works well. I mean, they were repeatedly, repeatedly slipping the brands of soap and cleaners into the living rooms and kitchens all over the US every single day, which is just perfect idea and well executed. So then, when TV arrives, years later in the 1950s, the model just adapts and improves because now you can show the products that you're trying to sell. It works even better and more companies get involved naturally. And that's just the way it stays. Soap operas have always been ground zero for product placement. And here's one example from Days of Our Lives, which is a long running soap opera in the US.
9:36 Speaker 00 Quite a bit later, this is 2012, but the structure of the placement is exactly the same as it always has been. Rob, can we have a look at this?
9:43 Speaker 02 Oh, except for these bad boys.
9:46 Speaker 03 Cheerios, you're a rebel at this hour.
9:49 Speaker 02 Hey now.
9:51 Speaker 00 How good is that?
9:54 Speaker 00 I mean, if it's safe to do so, have a look. If you can pull up the video here, because we're just looking at a box of Cheerios, just the hero of the whole scene. It's unreal.
10:05 Speaker 01 It's not subtle.
10:06 Speaker 00 It's not subtle at all. Soap operas are kind of easy in a way. There's new episodes every day. That means that there's lots of opportunities to work in products and storylines that help them look good. Movies, they're trickier because it's a one-off story and it only goes for a little while. The stars are bigger, the budgets are bigger, and so the cost of getting your product in there is naturally bigger too. But there's a starting point for movies as well, and it's widely thought to be the film The African Queen. 1951, it's got Humphrey Bogart, Catherine Hepburn. Now, it's shot in the Congo and Uganda, and apparently most of the cast and crew actually
10:48 Speaker 00 went down with dysentery from drinking contaminated water, including Hepburn.
10:55 Speaker 00 Actually, just on that, a quick aside. Humphrey Bogart later said that he and director John Huston didn't get sick because they ate only baked beans and canned asparagus and only drank whiskey. Quote from Bogart, "Whenever a fly bit Huston on me, it dropped dead."
11:14 Speaker 01 Those, they would have stunk.
11:15 Speaker 00 Can you imagine the smell?
11:16 Speaker 01 They would have stank.
11:17 Speaker 00 Can you imagine the smell, baked beans and asparagus and whiskey?
11:20 Speaker 01 Add whiskey.
11:21 Speaker 00 For weeks.
11:22 Speaker 01 Oh, foul.
11:24 Speaker 00 Just incredible. Not many showers, I would have thought either.
11:28 Speaker 01 No, it's tough.
11:29 Speaker 00 So that's, that's movies that they're toughest.
11:34 Speaker 00 Unreal. Anyway, for those who haven't seen the movie, there's this scene where Catherine Hepburn's character finds a case of gin and she dumps it overboard. And she's taking a bit of a stand. Now, the gin was Gordon's gin and Gordon's paid for it to be there. And Rob, that's probably the first recorded product placement in Hollywood.
11:58 Speaker 01 Do you think it was a success?
11:59 Speaker 00 Yeah, I think it was. I don't think it hurt one bit. Gordon's gin sales went through the roof in the US in the 1950s. But, you know, was it all down to this? Probably a bit hard to say. And that's a bit of a theme here because Gordon's, it had been teaming up with Schweppes. It had been marketing gin cocktails and look, it put, it put the gin in the hands of Catherine Hepburn in this movie. And that would have helped too, but it was an untested space. So they couldn't exactly measure the success. Over the next two or three decades, this sort of thing builds and grows. And over time, we ended up with basically three distinct types of product placement in TV and movies. The first type is completely organic. A director decides that, let's say a can of Coke looks right in the scene.
12:44 Speaker 00 And so he uses one and nobody pays. You've probably seen this sort of thing, Rob.
12:48 Speaker 01 Yeah, I think a good example for this is anyone who's seen Shaun of the Dead or Hot Fuzz.
12:53 Speaker 00 Yeah, love those movies.
12:54 Speaker 01 The Cornetto, features in those films, no money was exchanged. I think they just liked Cornetos. I think Edgar Wright was like, I like Cornetos.
13:02 Speaker 00 Really?
13:02 Speaker 01 And they had them in there. And particularly in Hot Fuzz, you've got some famous scenes of the police sitting there in their car, watching things play out and he's just eating a Cornetto.
13:10 Speaker 00 Yeah, yeah. They, if I'm not mistaken, I think they called that trilogy like the Cornetto trilogy or something.
13:16 Speaker 01 Yeah.
13:16 Speaker 00 God, that's incredible placement for free.
13:18 Speaker 01 Yeah.
13:19 Speaker 00 Well, there you go. That is organic.
13:20 Speaker 01 There you go.
13:22 Speaker 00 The second type is a trade. Now, the production team might need 50 cases of coke in exchange for screen time. And so it just gets it from coke and they just give it. That one to me is a little bit lame. It's a bit of a kind of a student film vibe. You know, we'll put you in a movie if you give us the stuff for free. Fine, whatever. And the third type is the actual money changing hands. Brands get a say here in the context and the appearance of the product. Writers are then given the task of turning it all into something that works in the script. And all the way through, there was one industry that made the most of all three types of product placement. Cigarette companies.
14:03 Speaker 01 It was prolific.
14:05 Speaker 00 It was.
14:05 Speaker 01 If you go back and you watch old movies or old TV, maybe you go to a relative's house and they've got it on the background. It almost looks like every second shot something's on fire. Because out of frame, someone is holding a cigarette and you don't realise. And you're like, why is there smoke coming up there? And then you might actually see someone smoke it. But so many black and white films, it's just like, what's burning over there?
14:27 Speaker 00 Prolific and right through into modern eras as well. And even if, even if they're doing historical movies, you know, now, they're smoking the whole time.
14:37 Speaker 01 Yeah.
14:38 Speaker 00 Yeah, it's a huge industry that.
14:40 Speaker 01 Yeah, hasn't really worked out with vapes, I don't think.
14:42 Speaker 00 I haven't seen that pivot done particularly elegantly, no.
14:46 Speaker 01 Not yet. A cool guy stopping to have a vape.
14:48 Speaker 00 No, mate, yeah, it's not the same, is it? And then, speaking of cigarettes, in 1971, a new law made them the absolute best customer of Hollywood. This basically goes to the centre of why cigarettes are everywhere when we're watching TV and movies. The US Congress banned direct cigarette advertising on television and radio effective immediately. That was January 1971, which sounds like a public health win. And it was, but as discussed, it took tobacco companies about five seconds flat just to switch to integrated advertising.
15:27 Speaker 00 You know, because there were no rules, Rob.
15:29 Speaker 01 There weren't. I think the famous scene I can think of with smoking in a film is Basic Instinct with Sharon Stone, just the whole time, just smoking. Iconic, absolutely iconic.
15:42 Speaker 00 There's a, there's a few iconic scenes in that movie, if I'm not mistaken.
15:45 Speaker 01 Yes, there's, there's a few.
15:47 Speaker 00 And some, some people know exactly what I'm talking about. Look, there's no regulation at all in that space. That's why it's favoured by alcohol and arms manufacturers. This particular type of gun is the only one that, let's say, Dirty Harry will use. Do you know what I mean?
16:02 Speaker 01 Yeah, I'd never thought of that.
16:03 Speaker 00 Cigarettes. Um, there's no disclosure really required. There's no oversight of any kind. A film can show a character smoking whatever brand it wants, in whatever flattering context it wants. And nobody has to tell the audience anything about it. Now, this goes pretty far, actually. In 1980, so just nine years after that bill passed, Philip Morris, which owns heaps of brands of cigarettes. It pays to have Marlboro in Superman two and Lois Lane, basically is just a chain smoker in that movie. Like every single shot of her, she's, she's sucking on a dart.
16:40 Speaker 01 Yeah. What's your one weakness? Well, it's ciggy, so.
16:42 Speaker 00 Oh, I could go for a dart, just call it. You know what I mean?
16:45 Speaker 01 Come on, Superman.
16:46 Speaker 00 Superman, you coming? Good God. And in 1983, Brown and Williams, another tobacco company, paid Sylvester Stallone half a million dollars to smoke their cigarettes in at least five movies. The cigarettes are in some of the movies, like Rambo and Rocky IV, but it's kind of not as full on as that Superman example. But that's really about how Stallone does the deal. And it's always done in a totally closed room negotiation.
17:14 Speaker 01 Do you think that, uh, Top Gun was an advertisement for Lockheed Martin to sell fighter jets to other countries?
17:19 Speaker 00 Maybe. You know what? Top Gun, Top Gun was actually, uh, did great things to sunglasses.
17:25 Speaker 01 Yeah, true.
17:25 Speaker 00 Aviator sunglasses, Ray Bans, you had to have them in there.
17:28 Speaker 01 Volleyball, I guess, yep.
17:29 Speaker 00 It's very hard to find an example, particularly of these massive budget movies in the late seventies, eighties and nineties that didn't just have this completely riddled throughout it.
17:37 Speaker 01 Hmm.
17:37 Speaker 00 And we're going to end up talking about a movie, a recent movie, that really kind of supernovates the whole thing, where there are reportedly a hundred different major brand dealers in the middle of it. But it just grows. It grows all the time.
17:52 Speaker 00 And as discussed, it's kind of the problem here that we're getting to is it's the central problem. It's kind of the whole point of this episode is that legislators never really step in because they can't. It becomes a cyclone of advertising with no rules, no disclosures. And the reason for that is that these TV shows and movies exist at the intersection of creative writing and commerce. Whether the character should be holding a cigarette or a chocolate bar is up to the writers and director. And if money changes hands, does that support an existing decision or does it create a problem? I mean, if an actor is meant to be eating a chocolate bar for the scene, and that was
18:37 Speaker 00 worked out ages ago, then getting a manufacturer to pay to put their chocolate bar in, I mean, that's sort of fine, I think, isn't it?
18:45 Speaker 01 Yeah, I, I, here's a question of personal preference. If you're watching a movie that is trying to be realistic and there's realism to it, do you, would you prefer to see a chocolate bar that you recognize? Or would you prefer to see, you know, fake chocolate bar label? Cause like-
19:01 Speaker 00 You do see both happen, don't you?
19:02 Speaker 01 Yeah. And like, there's also an argument that like, if you're trying to be real and do realism, showing a brand that people would recognize, you don't think about it. But if you saw some big dumb label of something that's not real, you might be like, what's that?
19:16 Speaker 00 Yeah, it might make you-
19:17 Speaker 01 You lose it a little bit.
19:17 Speaker 00 It might take you out of the scene a little. I hear what you're saying. And then the question, I suppose, develops into what if the manufacturer says, um, the manufacturer of the chocolate bar, that is, says, we want 10 separate features in the movie. We want you to put a billboard of our new lollies in the background of two shots. Um, you know, it becomes a little bit different. It stretches, it stretches that idea a little bit.
19:40 Speaker 01 Yeah. Hey, you're under arrest. Hold on. I've got to eat more chocolate bar.
19:43 Speaker 00 Just give me one second, one second. You know what I mean? It's sort of, it changes things and it, we never really get to know the calculation involved and it is sneaky. What ends up happening, of course, is a complete free for all where all types of products are being thrown into movies and TV together. And it's defendable because you can quite easily say that the writers just wanted that to be the case. Now, one of the guys who helped figure out exactly how to extract big checks from big companies, Steven Spielberg, he really, really knew his way around this stuff. And there's a great story that punctuates it perfectly. In 1982, Spielberg starts shopping around his next big movie, which is about a friendly
20:29 Speaker 00 alien, Rob.
20:30 Speaker 01 Hmm.
20:31 Speaker 00 Obviously, talking about the movie E.T. And before the movie comes out, Spielberg's production company went to Mars. Chocolate company, not the planet.
20:42 Speaker 01 Okay, they weren't doing some onsite research.
20:44 Speaker 00 No, no, the budgets were good, they weren't that good.
20:46 Speaker 01 Yeah.
20:47 Speaker 00 So they go to Mars, the people who make M and M's, and they say to them, we have this scene where our friendly, lovable alien finds pieces of candy. The kids use a trail of that candy to make the alien go where they want it to go. And we'll even have the alien say the brand out loud. Now, Spielberg wants it to be M and M's, that's his preference, and he wants them to pay for the product placement. Mars says, nah. They were a bit weirded out by the whole idea of an alien liking their product, I think. And, look, to be fair, they probably didn't know that about 200 million people were gonna see that scene.
21:28 Speaker 00 And the character in question was probably gonna be one of the most beloved, certainly of the eighties, maybe of all time.
21:36 Speaker 01 Oof, yeah, I, I, I can imagine the conversation where the Mars people are like, is this brand safe?
21:43 Speaker 00 Yeah, exactly.
21:44 Speaker 01 Yeah, and because, like, I don't know what that meeting was like, did they know what the alien looked like, did they know more about the plot? Or was it just Steven Spielberg going, hey, look at this movie about an alien, and he hangs out with kids and they feed him lollies? Like, it's...
21:56 Speaker 00 That's a good question, did he undercook the pitch? Look, by the research that I've done here, they knew quite a bit.
22:01 Speaker 01 Okay.
22:02 Speaker 00 They knew, obviously, that this is Steven Spielberg that they're talking to, who was already completely bankable by 1982. I mean, he'd had Jaws in 75, just to name one huge hit. You know, they saw, they had pictures of what the alien was gonna look like, they knew the storyline, they had detailed information about how the product would appear. They just hesitated, I think. So Spielberg says, okay, fine. We'll go and talk to Hershey's, which is their main competitor and they own Reese's Pieces, Peanut Butter Cups. He gives them the same pitch. They say yes, and it ends up being a bag of Reese's Pieces that's used to coax E T. Out of hiding, the alien eats them and says that famous thing of Reese's Pieces.
22:42 Speaker 01 Yes, I do.
22:44 Speaker 00 It's a bad impression, but people know what I'm talking about. Exactly, exactly. Now Reese's reportedly paid a million dollars for that placement and it was money well spent because E T comes out, it becomes the highest grossing film in history and Reese's Pieces sales jumped 65% within a month of release, Rob.
23:05 Speaker 01 Wow.
23:05 Speaker 00 Within one month. Now that story goes down in Hollywood folklore and nobody hesitates anymore after that. It obviously keeps on growing because both Hollywood and the brands figure out that there are three reasons why slipping your products into TV and movies works so well. So what are the reasons? Well, reason number one, if you put your brand in front of people often, then something called the mere exposure effect means that people will start liking it. It's advertising at its least sophisticated, but it works.
23:42 Speaker 01 Now, I've assumed you've seen the film Super Size Me or the documentary.
23:46 Speaker 00 Yeah.
23:47 Speaker 01 Super Size Me. The first half of that movie, I've never wanted a cheeseburger more in my life or McNuggets or anything else at McDonald's. Then obviously it turns and you don't want it. But I feel like that is the peak example of the mere exposure.
24:02 Speaker 00 I think you're right.
24:02 Speaker 01 The first half of that film, I challenge anyone to watch the first half of Super Size Me before he starts to get a bit unwell and not want to go to McDonald's.
24:09 Speaker 00 It's true. It's just peppering you with shots of these beautiful, big burgers.
24:14 Speaker 01 Yeah. Chips, milkshakes, thick shakes, nuggets, everything.
24:18 Speaker 00 That's right. And so it's the same exact theory. I mean, that's happening a lot, bang, bang, bang, bang, in the first half of that movie. But let's say you're driving to work the same way every single time and you see this simplest billboard in front of you every single day that just has, I don't know.
24:30 Speaker 01 Clown college. I'm not going to clown college.
24:36 Speaker 00 If there's a clown college billboard there every day, the mere exposure effect means that you're gonna end up sort of liking it a bit.
24:43 Speaker 01 Yeah.
24:43 Speaker 00 Absentmindedly.
24:44 Speaker 01 Yes.
24:45 Speaker 00 Reason number two that it works, when a person is watching a film that they like, they are in a better state of emotional engagement than if you're just showing them an ad. They're more receptive, which makes sense. Their mood helps them feel better about the product. And reason number three, if you put the ad inside the story, then the audience can't skip it. Hmm. Also makes sense, dead obvious, but these are the three reasons effectively that it works. Yeah. And that third one became incredibly important in 1999 with an invention that changed entertainment forever. And I'll tell you about it right after this very well flagged message from our partners, Rob. Let's do it.
25:28 Speaker 00 The old finance playbook, a steady job, property, super and patience, got a lot right. It's just not the whole picture anymore. The team behind IG Markets has 50 years in the industry. They've watched that system change and they've built something to sit alongside it. IG Markets is that next piece. Shares, ETFs and crypto all in one app. Simple, accessible and designed for people who want to take a more active hand in what they're building. This is new money. IG Markets believes every Australian deserves more ways to invest and they're here to help you find the way that suits you. Search IG Markets or download the app. IG Markets, this is new money.
26:12 Speaker 00 Crypto is unregulated and high risk. Investor protections do not apply. IG Digital Assets Australia, P T Y L T D is registered with Oz Track.
26:24 Speaker 00 What if your home loan isn't as competitive as it used to be? Loyalty is a lovely thing, but let's face it, your bank has never sent you flowers for it. Mortgage Choice can help you find a better deal. With more choice from over 35 lenders, they'll compare your options and crunch the numbers for you. And with more than a thousand brokers Australia wide, expert help is never far away. Plus, because they're part of realestate.com.au, they know the property market. So when it's time to get more from your home loan, refinance with Mortgage Choice. Talk to your local Mortgage Choice broker today.
27:00 Speaker 00 Rob, I'm sorry to do this.
27:04 Speaker 00 I'm just, oh my god, I'm just a bit, just a bit parched.
27:07 Speaker 01 Okay.
27:09 Speaker 00 It's good. I just really, I just really felt like this totally blood orange can.
27:17 Speaker 01 Oh yum.
27:18 Speaker 00 It's delicious. Hey, do you want one?
27:20 Speaker 01 No, I've actually, um.
27:22 Speaker 00 Oh, you've got one?
27:22 Speaker 01 I've got one right here.
27:23 Speaker 00 Oh, perfect.
27:23 Speaker 01 Yeah.
27:24 Speaker 00 I mean, it's hitting the spot.
27:26 Speaker 01 Oh, it's refreshing.
27:27 Speaker 00 Hmm. No, it's good.
27:29 Speaker 01 No sugar. Wow, that's, that's.
27:30 Speaker 00 I know, right?
27:31 Speaker 01 Yeah, that's incredible.
27:31 Speaker 00 Yeah, it's wild. I've been drinking them a lot lately because it's kind of guilt free. I like a soft drink, but sugar's a problem sometimes.
27:38 Speaker 01 Hmm.
27:39 Speaker 00 Good call. Anyway, look, what were we talking about? We were talking about the invention that changed everything in 1999. And I don't think we ever actually got this product by this name in Australia, Rob, but it was huge in the US. It's called TiVo, 1999.
27:57 Speaker 01 Yeah, I remember listening to, it was a radio show at the time, and there was a long discussion about how media players in this country basically stopped it from coming.
28:11 Speaker 00 Oh.
28:12 Speaker 01 Because they tried to bring it here, but the people who control the big media companies here in Australia did their part, so TiVo didn't get here.
28:19 Speaker 00 There you go.
28:20 Speaker 01 They were able to impact that and prevent it from happening.
28:23 Speaker 00 So TiVo is a product, but the thing that it did, did make it to Australia, of course. It allowed people to record shows and then skip the ad break. So digital TV ended up getting there, but it wasn't in 1999. It took it a fair bit longer.
28:38 Speaker 00 It made putting your ads into actual ad breaks less valuable because you could skip them. And that's when product placement becomes a main way of advertising, not just a secondary, nice to have, side project type of thing. And so it graduates again. So it becomes quite big, quite fast. By 2006, only seven years after TiVo launches in the US, brands were spending about 1.6 billion US dollars a year on product placement in movies and 1.8 billion in TV. Again, these numbers are pretty rubbery, but they show the trend. And it became much more obvious, which makes sense if the cost to the brands is going up.
29:21 Speaker 00 Think about American Idol around this time. It was huge here. We had Australian Idol as well, of course.
29:26 Speaker 01 Yep.
29:27 Speaker 00 But over there, it was AT&T and Coca-Cola. They were paying millions to be integrated into every element of the show. Judges were drinking from branded cups. You voted by text. Of course, that was AT&T.
29:42 Speaker 01 Yes, of course.
29:44 Speaker 00 I mean, we didn't even know that brand in Australia, but it was huge. Like, we all became familiar. All of a sudden, Integrated Branding Officer is a really important job at all these big companies. And a quick search on LinkedIn, Rob, will show that there's plenty of Integrated Branding Officer jobs around.
30:00 Speaker 01 Hmm.
30:00 Speaker 00 This is a huge part of the workforce now.
30:02 Speaker 01 Do I get that brand integration?
30:04 Speaker 00 You do. You need somebody to take care of it for you. And there's a big business that sits at the centre of this product placement world. And Rob, do you know who owns it?
30:13 Speaker 01 Uh, nope. Who owns it?
30:15 Speaker 00 Bill Gates.
30:15 Speaker 01 Bill!
30:16 Speaker 00 Bill, welcome to the show, Bill.
30:18 Speaker 01 Long time.
30:19 Speaker 00 I know. It's called Ben Labs. And Ben stands for Branded Entertainment Network. And Bill Gates acquired it a few years ago. Now, it handled things like the Dunkin' Donuts placement in House of Cards. It handled GM, the car, in Barbie, Tin Cup Whiskey and Jessica Jones, Jose Cuervo and Fuller House, does all this stuff. Basically, the widely regarded rule of thumb here is getting your product into a Netflix or Amazon show through Ben reportedly, probably costs anywhere between $50,000 US, a half a million per episode.
30:57 Speaker 01 Wow.
30:58 Speaker 00 Not a bad business to be in.
30:59 Speaker 01 Hmm.
31:00 Speaker 00 And about three quarters of the shows on Netflix now contain at least one placement. Almost all Amazon shows do.
31:10 Speaker 00 And here's an interesting point, I think. The studio keeps the money, not the writer, not the director or the cast, because none of those things are the business. They're all costs associated with the product. And the studio is the business. And that dynamic gets well described by the team behind It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia. You know that show? I sure do. Awesome show. A few years ago, they did a podcast where they talk about old episodes and they did one for the episode, The Great Recession, which is in season five. And they said that the studio told them, hey, Dave and Buster's will pay to work them into an episode. So go do that. Dave and Buster's being an arcade restaurant situation. Yep. And they absolutely nail it, in my opinion. It's a great episode. It's a great episode. Yeah.
31:56 Speaker 00 And a lot of it takes place in Dave and Buster's. And it's kind of seamless. I think it really works. But the cast explains that the dynamic is always that the people working on the show always want to get picked up for more seasons. That's the incentive and deals like the Dave and Buster's one become important for longevity, not for paydays. The way it works is the network usually uses that money to justify production costs. And the show benefits indirectly from that. It becomes a profitable show for the network rather than one that costs them lots of money. So it's more likely to get picked up for more seasons and everyone keeps their job. Know what I mean? Yep. I thought that was a really interesting way to describe that because it did two things for me. It showed a really interesting brand integration, which I wouldn't have picked up on. Yep.
32:43 Speaker 00 And it sort of explains how that particular economy works. And then it also, if you go one step further, it describes this stuff up that the studio actually made by going too hard. Because the other thing that they say in that podcast is that, yep, we did the integration with Dave and Buster's. But when that episode debuted, they also sold all the ads in the ad breaks to Dave and Buster's. So you're watching the episode Bang, Dave and Buster's and then all of a sudden the kind of the curtain's drawn back and you see that really you're just getting sold to.
33:11 Speaker 01 Gotcha.
33:11 Speaker 00 There's a lot of pushback there and the cast and crew and writers were all a bit pissed off that that ended up happening.
33:17 Speaker 01 Yeah, because how we watch the show, obviously we wouldn't see it broadcasted live like it is in the States. So I wouldn't have known that. I'd just see it there at Dave and Buster's and be like, oh, it's funny.
33:26 Speaker 00 Yeah, exactly.
33:27 Speaker 01 And I didn't really think about it.
33:28 Speaker 00 Don't think about it. But if you'd see an ad in between, you'd think, oh, something's up.
33:31 Speaker 01 Yeah.
33:31 Speaker 00 Now, mostly so far, I've talked about how this system has been wildly successful and able to sidestep regulation and everything's great. So what about when it goes wrong? Well, the best example of that is the movie Jerry Maguire and the Reebok disaster. Do you remember that movie, Rob?
33:50 Speaker 01 Show me the money.
33:51 Speaker 00 Show me the money.
33:52 Speaker 01 Show me the money.
33:52 Speaker 00 This is like a greatest hits of the movies that we loved, I think.
33:56 Speaker 01 Yeah.
33:57 Speaker 00 I mean, it probably shows that, that, you know, this is from our perspective.
34:01 Speaker 01 Yes, of course.
34:03 Speaker 00 Obviously, but still, you remember Show Me The Money and Jerry Maguire. Reebok paid one and a half million US dollars to be in it. And here's what they got for their money. Cuba Gooding Jr.'s character Rod Tidwell spends the entire movie complaining that Reebok won't sign him, that they disrespect him all the time and they don't understand his value. In fact, his rant culminates in the line, fuck Reebok, in the middle of the movie.
34:28 Speaker 01 Why would, why would they pay for that?
34:31 Speaker 00 Because the whole point was that there would be a redemption arc. The original script had Tidwell appearing in a Reebok commercial at the end and Reebok was going to be like, oh, we were wrong, we love you. And it would be a very warm and fuzzy positive moment for Reebok.
34:46 Speaker 01 Yeah.
34:48 Speaker 00 But the director Cameron Crowe just cut all that out.
34:55 Speaker 00 He just said, no, I don't like it anymore. Yeah, I was gonna say, I don't remember that saying. I don't remember it either. So the movie ended up going out as just a a lot of bagging Reebok with No Redemption, but they pocketed one and a half million bucks, which is hilarious, really. And obviously, Reebok was gonna be furious and obviously they were gonna sue, which they did. They tried to sue TriStar Pictures for $10 million. Pretty open and shut kind of case. Absolutely. Yeah, total breach of contract. I mean, hard to argue. The case gets settled out of court and we don't know exactly how much money, but here's what we do know. If you watch Jerry Maguire today on maybe TV or streaming, the fake Reebok commercial is
35:39 Speaker 00 quite often back in the end of the film. And that was almost certainly part of the settlement. And good on them in a way for fighting because you can't do that. Everyone, I mean, sure, you can do whatever you want from a creative perspective, but you know, you probably should give them money back if you're gonna do that. Yep, yep. The lessons that everyone learns here become be specific, put it in a contract, guarantee the screen time, guarantee the edit, hire someone to watch the cut before it goes out. And as a result, everything is now arranged down to the second and lighting and character and all that sort of stuff. Like, for example, Rob, I'm wearing this
36:22 Speaker 00 excellent advertising tee from Cool Shirts, right? And they might say that I need to wear it as my outermost garment and that the graphics need to be visible, unobstructed, legible to viewers. But of course, this is an audio podcast too. So I might need to cover the essential talking points like the quality of the fabric is very, very high. And Cool Shirts sells lots of great stuff too, like jumpers and hats and jewelry. I mean, I could even have a call to action, I guess, that you could click the link in bio hypothetically. I've got mine on. Oh, you've got yours on too? Yeah, it's great. Is it good? It's very comfortable. It's lovely. That's the microplastics tee. Yeah, it's the microplastics. I do love microplastics. That's available for purchase? Yeah, it is. Yeah, no, it's terrific. I think it looks good too. It's a flattering fit, if I may.
37:07 Speaker 00 All that's just hypothetically now, but so in the last few years, this has become an exact science and the scales are being tipped. I think it's fair to say all of a sudden you've got ads that appear as movies. One of the things about all business systems is if they exist in the economy for long enough, they become monsters. People work out how to really ramp them up. It's actually becoming a key thread in this series of ours. Like this is why we can't have nice things.
37:42 Speaker 00 Rob, do you remember the Barbie movie?
37:43 Speaker 01 Sure do.
37:44 Speaker 00 Hard to have missed it, right?
37:45 Speaker 01 Yeah.
37:45 Speaker 00 2023, huge movie. Did you watch it?
37:49 Speaker 01 I did, it was good.
37:50 Speaker 00 I thought it was okay.
37:50 Speaker 01 Yeah.
37:51 Speaker 00 I mean, it got a lot of hype.
37:53 Speaker 01 I might not have been the target demographic.
37:55 Speaker 00 Yeah, I mean, but it was enjoyable.
37:56 Speaker 01 It was enjoyable.
37:57 Speaker 00 Entertaining.
37:57 Speaker 01 Yeah.
37:58 Speaker 00 Kind of held your attention. Look, even at the time, it was more about the advertising campaign than the movie. It was spectacular. Warner Brothers paid Mattel somewhere between 25 million and 50 million dollars for the rights to make the Barbie film, which is incredible because it ended up being a full commercial for the toy company that was getting paid for the rights. And on top of that, they sold over a hundred other brand partnerships. Tag, watches, Primark, Burger King, Airbnb, General Motors. Meanwhile, Mattel's CEO described his strategy in public to journalists as transforming
38:37 Speaker 00 Mattel from a toy manufacturing company making items to an IP company managing franchises. He said that out loud, it was his whole thing. And that is now the business. Mattel has 45 movies or thereabouts in various states of development. 13 are officially announced. We're talking Barney the Dinosaur, Hot Wheels.
39:02 Speaker 00 Apparently there's an Uno card game movie in the works. I know. I don't know how you figure that.
39:09 Speaker 01 Does it, is the ending someone putting down a draw for? And then the other person getting really angry at them?
39:15 Speaker 00 That's right. Flipping the table.
39:17 Speaker 01 Yeah.
39:17 Speaker 00 Reverse.
39:18 Speaker 01 Yeah. How dare you?
39:19 Speaker 00 How dare you? Whole family's in an argument now.
39:21 Speaker 01 Yeah.
39:23 Speaker 00 But the Barbie thing worked so well. This is now the new direction for toys, movies. Not to mention the Toy Story franchise, which went the other direction. Movie first, sell the toys after the fact. But, you know, we'll give them a pass because we all love Toy Story.
39:38 Speaker 01 Yep.
39:38 Speaker 00 No shade.
39:39 Speaker 01 Yep.
39:40 Speaker 00 But let's look at the numbers. The production budget for the Barbie movie was about 145 million US dollars. The marketing budget of the movie was reportedly about 150 million US dollars. So it was more, so they're close to 300 million dollars in costs. Now, the movie made about a billion at the box office within the first three weeks.
40:02 Speaker 01 Incredible.
40:03 Speaker 00 So the marketing worked.
40:04 Speaker 01 Incredible.
40:04 Speaker 00 Obviously.
40:05 Speaker 01 Yeah.
40:05 Speaker 00 Incredible. The simple system works just fine. You pay a lot of money to make the movie. You pay a lot of money to market it and then you make your money back at the box office. But the more complex secondary product placement system added many more millions to the bottom line. We don't know exactly how much or exactly the value that it created for the brands back the other direction. Who were paying for those placements. That stays private, but we know that it worked. What we also know is how people perceive all this. And it's actually surprisingly positive. Here's the point, I think, of the whole episode.
40:45 Speaker 00 52% of Americans think product placement is an effective way of advertising. Only 14% think it's ineffective. 44% say they have taken some action after seeing a brand in an entertainment context. Search for it online, visited the website, considered buying it. And 10% say that they've actually purchased something as a result. And remember, if you're reaching 50 or 100 million people, 10% is a lot.
41:17 Speaker 01 Sure is.
41:17 Speaker 00 It's an enormous number. And of course, the other thing to say about this is that that's what people think they're doing. And the whole point of this type of advertising is that it's subliminal. So those numbers are probably a bit low. This whole world of product placement is still dominated by the stories that I've told today, like E T cigarettes, Jerry Maguire, from decades ago, back when this system was still being worked out. The thing is, it's matured now. It's fully industrialized and it's moving into new places
41:57 Speaker 00 like virtual placement, using technology to retroactively insert products into existing footage. You know, a show made in 2010 can now have a 2026 brand dropped into the background of a scene, which you'd probably never know, certainly not if you're watching it for the first time. I mean, it's already happening. I think it's safe to say, Rob. I mean, I suppose the question is, how would you feel about that?
42:25 Speaker 01 Look, I don't mind. Um, like I've thought about this a bit, you know, researching this episode and then doing it today. Being somewhat myself in the entertainment industry, not obviously the scale of making Hollywood movies, like if there's a way to get things made and it means that you have to do a little bit of corporization, I think it's okay. I think it's okay if it means that we can see more movies and TV shows that we like. The thing though is that there's probably a few genres of stuff that kind of, it doesn't really happen. You know, I enjoy a good, you know, medieval TV show like a Game of Thrones or a sci fi film. And like, you're not going to say, you know, King Arthur pull out a can of Coke. So those sort of things aren't possible, but stuff that is more set in, you know, modern times and reality, it's like, well, this is often how you get stuff made these days.
43:10 Speaker 00 Good point.
43:11 Speaker 01 You kind of have to fit it in. And look, if it means that people can make good TV shows, good movies, and they have to put a can of something in the background or a chocolate bar. I think that's a good thing.
43:22 Speaker 00 It's a fair commercial argument to make.
43:24 Speaker 01 Yeah.
43:24 Speaker 00 When you said the medieval thing, you know what came to my mind though?
43:27 Speaker 01 The coffee cup in Game of Thrones? Whether there was a coffee cup just sitting in the back.
43:32 Speaker 00 Not even. Like, you know what actually came to my mind? Do you remember the movie A Knight's Tale with Heath Ledger?
43:36 Speaker 01 Yeah, love that movie.
43:37 Speaker 00 When he gets his new suit of armor made and there's a Nike swoosh on it?
43:40 Speaker 01 That's right.
43:40 Speaker 00 Isn't that incredible?
43:41 Speaker 01 I forgot about that.
43:42 Speaker 00 Like, just, oh yeah, we'll just, we'll sneak that in, no one will know.
43:45 Speaker 01 Yeah.
43:45 Speaker 00 Yeah, but I think the real question here is how you feel about it. Look, this is probably gonna sound like a pretty lame thing to say, but from an artistic perspective. So I gave the Happy Gilmore example earlier. That's probably not what you would consider to be high art in the filmmaking business.
44:01 Speaker 01 No.
44:02 Speaker 00 But if you watched it now and instead of Subway, you were shown that he was advertising KFC, how would you feel about that?
44:09 Speaker 01 I don't think I would care.
44:11 Speaker 00 You don't think you care?
44:12 Speaker 01 No.
44:12 Speaker 00 I'd feel a bit, I'd feel a bit, you know, jarred, I think.
44:16 Speaker 01 You reckon?
44:16 Speaker 00 Uh, cause I got so used to it. You watch these things so often.
44:19 Speaker 01 Yeah.
44:20 Speaker 00 You know, it cements itself in your mind a bit. I mean, if somebody who'd never seen it before saw it and they wouldn't care. But I think I'd feel a bit put out.
44:28 Speaker 01 Yeah, I guess so. Like, I guess if you are used to one particular version of it, or at least the first one they did this way, then the second one they changed the brand, maybe. I think it also might just depend on what the film is.
44:39 Speaker 00 Yeah.
44:39 Speaker 01 You know, like if it's Happy Gilmore and you see it, you're like, okay. But if it was some, you know, deep, you know, Oscar bait film where you've got, you know, Helen Mirren and, I'm trying to think of a male actor off the top of my head, but you know, some big name, there's a dramatic scene and then she's like, hold on, I'm just gonna have my Kit Kat.
44:56 Speaker 00 Yeah.
44:56 Speaker 01 You know, like.
44:57 Speaker 00 Yeah, I get that.
44:58 Speaker 01 You know?
44:58 Speaker 00 I personally love that you went straight to Helen Mirren.
45:02 Speaker 01 Hey, she's a god.
45:03 Speaker 00 I'm learning about Rob that your favorite actor in the world is Helen Mirren.
45:10 Speaker 00 Justice for Helen, more Oscars.
45:12 Speaker 01 Yeah, more Oscars for Helen Mirren, please.
45:15 Speaker 00 Look, I think the truth is, this is something that I hope people in the comment section chirp about and say whether or not they care or whether or not they don't, because it's, it's, you know, you have your own opinions on it. The point is, I think, consumers are still paying for the entertainment, like we always have, but the entertainment now comes with a much more sophisticated commercial system living inside it.
45:40 Speaker 00 So what do I reckon about all this? I think it's a weird feeling to look closely at a product placement industry. But you kind of just end up feeling like, wow, this is kind of impressive. The industry is usually incredibly good at its job. Is the goal still to be undetected? I don't know, maybe not. Maybe that's what's disappearing. But it does an incredible job, you have to say, and it is growing incredibly quickly still.
46:14 Speaker 01 Sure is.
46:15 Speaker 00 To this day.
46:15 Speaker 01 Sure is.
46:17 Speaker 00 Okay, now. Three products were natively placed in this episode.
46:26 Speaker 01 Chris just did air quotes for people listening.
46:28 Speaker 00 Yeah, I did air quotes. I put them up there because I don't know how native the placement was. If I'm self critiquing, it was a bit clunky.
46:36 Speaker 01 Yeah. I think we did okay.
46:38 Speaker 00 Thanks, man. Two were not paid. One was in a way paid. I'll get to that in a second. I talked about Ajax Spray and Wipe, owned by Colgate Palmolive, brought it up. I said it smelled really nice, which it does. I think, not in a like a nice, nice way, but nice for what it is.
46:57 Speaker 01 Cleaning product, nice.
46:58 Speaker 00 Yeah, exactly. I drank a soda, no sugar. Had a little bit more then. And I wore this very fetching CoolShirts t-shirt to illustrate the point. Rob, thoughts? He says, he's sitting there in a CoolShirts t-shirt.
47:15 Speaker 01 Yeah, while I sip my soda. I mean, look, I, two of the three things I've been provided by. So I feel like if Ajax were paying us some money, I would have received some cleaning products. So I'm gonna, I'm gonna strike that out. I think, I think. Maybe this is just you like, you know, subtly telling me to clean this studio by rolling. He was cleaning products.
47:32 Speaker 00 Yeah, exactly.
47:33 Speaker 01 Clean it up, Rob.
47:34 Speaker 00 I'm trying to fleece this, this place every which way I can.
47:36 Speaker 01 Yeah. Look, I'm gonna, I'm gonna go and say it was the soda. It's just, I thought, I thought your, your read was impeccable. So I'm gonna go with that.
47:45 Speaker 00 Incorrect. I know, but I like the way you were thinking. It was the T-shirt.
47:49 Speaker 01 Okay.
47:50 Speaker 00 It was a T-shirt. And this is incredibly appropriate because it says advertising is awesome. I love being marketed to. Now, the owner of the T-shirt company and I did a handshake agreement. He said he'd give me a slab of beer. So it's not technically pay to play. And I feel bad about sort of fibbing to you, so I'll split the beer with you.
48:06 Speaker 01 Great.
48:07 Speaker 00 Yeah.
48:07 Speaker 01 I'm down.
48:07 Speaker 00 And you can keep the T-shirt.
48:08 Speaker 01 Cool. Thank you.
48:10 Speaker 00 I'll keep this one. I think the point is, and I'm keen to hear whether or not people thought these placements were imperceptible.
48:19 Speaker 01 Yep.
48:20 Speaker 00 I doubt it.
48:20 Speaker 01 No.
48:22 Speaker 00 The point is, I think, that any of them could have been paid. It's a surprisingly hard game to win if you're watching content and you're trying to guess what's paid and what's not. So that's how we got here. From tin beans and asparagus in the Congo to $50,000 to put Dunkin' Donuts into a Netflix episode. And now me, wearing a T-shirt that says advertising is awesome. Solid distance we've covered here today, Rob.
48:53 Speaker 01 Yeah, we've done, we've done well. I think just to go back to the discussion we were happening before about, you know, art versus commercial. I think if we did this podcast 10 years ago, when I was a bit younger, I would have leant towards the art. We're trying to run a small business. I understand the pressures involved. And if there's a way to make the bottom line a bit better, I think that's okay.
49:12 Speaker 00 What if it's not about making the bottom line a bit better? It's about turning your $300 million investment into a billion and then into perhaps many more hundreds of millions after that?
49:22 Speaker 01 Well, that's where I guess greed comes into it. But that, that is the question is like, are you trying to, are you trying to make film and TV for art? Or are you just in it for the money? And that's probably what, you know, really divides a lot of Hollywood. And you'd say today, most stuff is in the money-making category. You hear plenty of interviews of directors and actors talking about how you can't get original IP made and everything's a remake of something or it's, you know, the Uno movie.
49:49 Speaker 00 Yep.
49:49 Speaker 01 For example, because they need stuff that's bankable. They need stuff that can fit these ads in, fit the criteria, which is why when you do get a really good series that is clean, it doesn't seem to have any brand integrations in it and it's. You know, maybe too difficult too. You've got to appreciate that. So.
50:06 Speaker 00 I totally agree. I think it's a really interesting grey area and one that you could talk about all day. I think the place that I'm going to be keen to watch out for in the future is that retroactive changing of things.
50:16 Speaker 01 Yeah.
50:16 Speaker 00 Because that dynamic that you described, you know, needing the money upfront before you commit to a project, that is absolutely real. But people still appreciate old content. And I know that on the major streaming platforms, catalog content or old content is still really important. So I'm going to be fascinated to see over time whether or not things change retroactively and whether or not that becomes a big part of those businesses. Because I think that's where it becomes a little bit more fraught, changing things that already exist.
50:46 Speaker 01 Yeah. I think if you're going back and watching an old film and Humphrey Bogart has a vape, we've crossed the line.
50:52 Speaker 00 Yeah. I mean, but not even that. Like, you know, things that could have been in that deal, but they just weren't. Like, it was a Happy Gilmore did the deal with Subway, could have been any number of businesses. And then if they revisit that, if Adam Sandler's production company revisits it, says, hey, no, we're open for business. Let's cut a deal. We didn't do the deal then, we can do the deal now.
51:13 Speaker 01 Yeah.
51:14 Speaker 00 You know, it's, I think that's a really interesting one.
51:15 Speaker 01 Yeah, it is.
51:17 Speaker 00 Open your thoughts in the comments as always. But thank you very much. I'm Chris Kohler. Thank you for listening as always. Rob, thank you for your time and input.
51:25 Speaker 01 Happy to be here.
51:26 Speaker 00 Next time on How We Got Here, buying your video game character expensive clothes and that whole universe.
51:33 Speaker 01 Fun.
51:34 Speaker 00 Fun. Thank you very much for listening. See you next time.
51:38 Speaker 00 Mars said no, Hershey's said yes. One decision, one movie. And Reese's Pieces went from an afterthought to a cultural icon because someone saw the opportunity and seized it. For Australians who know there's more to investing than waiting and hoping, IG Markets gives you access to those opportunities. Shares, ETFs and crypto, all in one app. Backed by 50 years of industry experience, built for what comes next. The opportunities are out there in Australia and abroad. IG Markets helps you find. Find them and take them. It's investing that doesn't need a 20% deposit, doesn't need you to wait 30 years and starts with whatever you have.
52:22 Speaker 00 Search IG Markets or download the app from your app store to get started today. IG Markets, this is new money. Crypto is unregulated and high risk. Share trading services by IG Australia, P T Y L T D A F S L 515106. Crypto services by IG Digital Assets Australia, P T Y L T D.
52:46 Speaker 00 Looking to buy your first home? With the latest federal budget putting first home buyers firmly in focus, now's the perfect time to explore your options with your local mortgage choice broker. For over 30 years, mortgage choice brokers have been helping Aussies find the right home loan. They give you more choice, comparing options from over 35 lenders, and they'll do more of the heavy lifting, comparing lenders, crunching the numbers, and finding the right fit for your situation. Get more expertise on your site. Choose more with Mortgage Choice. Talk to your local Mortgage Choice broker today.
Previous Hang on... was Tupperware a pyramid scheme? Next The Toxic Economy of Gaming Page updated October 29, 2026 · transcript and summary are machine-generated