Continental Drift
Sony and Warner Home Video are taking a promotional blueprint that’s worked well for them in the U.S. across the Atlantic. In the first joint European marketing campaign launched by a hardware manufacturer and an entertainment software company, the two are using a multi-tiered initiative to boost sales of DVD players and movie and music titles across the continent.
Sony and Warner this month begin luring European shoppers into retail stores with an offer of three free movie titles from Warner Home Video with the purchase of a DVD player. The all-American movie selection – Lethal Weapon 4, You’ve Got Mail, and Payback – was selected for its mass appeal, says Steve Nickerson, Warner Home Video’s VP of DVD marketing worldwide. The offer is being made throughout Europe.
The two companies are rolling out the eight-month promotion in two executions to keep the offer fresh in consumers’ minds. The first phase runs April 15 to July 15 and is supported via P-O-P, country-specific retail events, print ads, and TV spots via Saatchi & Saatchi, London. >From September through December, the duo will offer new movies and launch new TV spots. Sony’s European headquarters is in Berlin. The promotion was developed in-house on both sides.
Throughout the effort, in-store demos will be staged at retail stores in many markets. The demos will give shoppers a look at the “new dimension” of home entertainment DVD can provide, and will push other Sony products including wide-screen TVs, smart-engine video recorders, digital sound receivers, and surround-sound speakers. Consumers who buy other Sony home-cinema products along with a DVD player receive a pair of bonus Warner titles, L.A. Confidential and Space Jam.
DVD is nearly a household word in the U.S. The technology debuted in 1998 to become the most successful consumer electronics launch in retail history. Sales of stand-alone players more than tripled in 1999 to $1 billion-plus, according to data from DVD Entertainment Group, Los Angeles. Sales of DVD movie and music titles passed the $2 billion mark last year.
DVD Entertainment, a nonprofit association created to help speed the technology’s adoption, has spearheaded industry-wide campaigns in which Sony, Warner, and most other hardware manufacturers and movie studios have offered five free titles with player purchases. Warner pitched in last year with the aforementioned Lethal Weapon 4 for the industry-wide effort, then worked individually with hardware maker Toshiba to give $50 rebates on player purchases with the rental of two movies in either DVD or VHS format.
Sony debuted its DVD equipment last year in Europe, where unit sales broke the one-million mark over the Christmas holidays. (U.S. units surpassed five million last year.) “This format has become the must-have consumer electronics product in Europe,” says Sony Home Network vp-Europe Georges Gerard. Marketing efforts “might accelerate the growing trend,” says Nickerson.
Other industry players are undertaking similar action. Twentieth Century Fox last fall announced broad bundling alliances with player manufacturers around the world: Thomson in Europe, Sony in Latin America, and Matsushita in Asia. In a deal that runs through August, Thomson is providing print ads, P-O-P, demonstration discs, and in-pack materials to support Fox releases.
Sony and Warner Home Video are counting on the promotions to help move 60 million DVD titles and four million DVD players in 2000. (Sony sold one million DVD players in Europe last year). Additional promotion activity in each country will depend on sales in each region.
The partners appear confident the effort will achieve its objectives, even though some countries such as Germany are harder to penetrate because of government regulations on marketing.
Maybe they should offer some Marlene Dietrich movies.
