The limited-time offer is one of the oldest tricks in the marketing book and The Walt Disney Co. worked it to perfection last weekend when tweens spent $31.3 million to see the studio’s latest hit, Hannah Montana & Miley Cyrus: Best of Both Worlds Concert.
But now that the 3-D film’s run has been extended, were parents duped into rushing their kids to the theatre? Or was it just another case of Disney’s marketing mastery?
As most media companies are ceding control of when and where consumers can watch shows or listen to music, Disney is managing its content as tightly as ever. And based on the movie’s results—the Hannah Montana film set a record for any movie opening on a Super Bowl weekend—people are falling over themselves to keep Disney’s schedule.
“When you have a successful franchise, setting the time table and controlling the distribution just develops an appetite for more,” said Michael Kupinski, media analyst and head of research at Noble Financial Group. “No one is as good at this as Disney.”
The company rode the strength of its Pirates of the Caribbean, High School Musical and Hannah Montana to a 9% increase in fourth-quarter revenue and better-than-expected earnings. Fees at its ESPN sports networks and higher visitors to Disney theme parks also boosted earnings.
Robert Iger, Disney’s president and chief executive, credited the company’s focus on developing brands and producing content across its various media and theme park properties.
“Five years ago we could count upon only two major franchises, and today we have 10 vibrant, creative properties,” Iger said in a conference call with Wall Street analysts.
Hannah Montana fits the mould perfectly. It started as a TV show on the Disney Channel and the concert tour generated $36 million in ticket revenue last year. The movie has already grossed more than five times the $7 million the company said it cost to make. Disney plans to produce a third season of the TV show and may produce a feature film based on the show.
The company says it planned all along for a one-week run for the Hannah Montana film, envisioning it as an extension of the wildly popular concert tour that played to sold-out arenas across the country last year. But then the studio gave theatre operators the option to show the film for as long as they like.
