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A DVD Marketing Campaign
Horton Would Definitely Hear
Brooks Barnes
The New York Times
July 28, 2008
Horton will be huge, at least if
20th Century Fox has anything to say about it.
The movie studio, part of the News Corporation, is
backing the arrival of the animated film “Dr. Seuss’
Horton Hears a Who!” on DVD with one of the biggest
marketing pushes in the medium’s history. Fox executives
are boasting that the campaign is intended to generate
more than 200 million “consumer impressions.”
A 66-foot-long balloon of Horton — who is, as most of us
know, an elephant with a beautiful soul — will be in the
Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade. Macy’s will also stock
stuffed Hortons in its more than 800 stores. In a
slightly odd promotion, L’Oréal plans to sell
Horton-inspired shampoos (perhaps because of Horton’s
wee tuft of black hair). About 300,000 bottles of
“Horton Whoberry” will soon arrive at stores.
20th Century Fox has also lined up Energy Star, the
government program that promotes energy-efficient
products and practices. Working off the movie’s message
that a person is a person no matter how small, Energy
Star plans television spots for children about how they
can help save the environment. (Presumably, asking their
parents to buy the Horton DVD has something to do with
it.)
The movie, based on the 1954 children’s book by Theodor
Geisel, known as Dr. Seuss, has sold $295.2 million in
tickets around the world, according to the theater
tracking company Box Office Mojo — which is one reason
that Fox says it has the potential to become another
“Alvin and the Chipmunks.” That movie, also from Fox, is
the best-selling DVD of the year so far.
But Fox has another motive. With DVD sales softening —
the $16 billion domestic business had its first annual
decline last year — the studio is spending a bit more
energy on marketing, hoping to reverse or at least
stabilize sales figures in advance of the all-important
fourth quarter.
That would help quiet analysts and the media, who have
been harping on weakness in the DVD market.
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