4. Advertising Analysis

According to Lexico (powered by Oxford), product placement is defined as “a practice in which manufacturers of goods or providers of a service gain exposure for their products by paying for them to be featured in films and television programmes.”  Product placement has been around for a long time. One of the first movies to feature product placement is the 1920s film The Garage. However, it did not become a big advertising strategy until E.T. featured Reese’s Pieces in 1982 (Premium Beat). Now, you can see examples of product placement in nearly every movie and TV show.  

Netflix 

While Netflix does not have advertisements, they do have product placement in their content. I have seen many movies on Netflix where the characters play other Netflix movies or scroll through Netflix. Some of their movies also have product placement, like in The Knight Before Christmas, or Stranger Things. In The Knight Before Christmas, one of the main characters uses an Amazon Echo for about 10 minutes. They also mention a country from a different Netflix movie, which Netflix says is because all of the movies happen within the same universe (Insider). In Stranger Things, they talk about the new Coke that came out in the 80s. Netflix says that "none of the brands and products that appear in 'Stranger Things 3' were paid for or placed by third parties" (American Marketing Association).

Netflix also does a sort of ‘reverse’ product placement, where they asked other businesses to help them promote their shows. They did this with ‘Green Eggs and Ham’ by getting Subway to create a themed sandwich to sell during the promotional period. Baskin Robbins collaborated with Netflix to have Stranger Things themed ice cream flavors, including the ‘Upside Down Sundae’ and ‘Eleven’s Heaven.’ (USA Today) 

Disney Plus

Although Disney Plus is new, it has also started into product placement with one of its Christmas movies. Noelle, starring Anna Kendrick, contains Apple product placement. In the movie, Anna Kendrick’s character mentions that every kid wants an iPad for Christmas. The elves continue to push this idea throughout the movie. (Screen Rant) 

Movies

Product placement is the most popular in movies. I’m sure most everyone has seen some kind of Hallmark movie with the Folgers coffee in the background. (Community) Recently, the new Sonic the Hedgehog movie premiered, and some viewers have an issue with one of the product placements. Throughout the movie, the characters mention Olive Garden, as well as their slogan, “When you’re here, you’re family." Later on in the movie, someone from the United States government comes up to their house with a $50 gift card to Olive Garden.There were also scenes mentioning the real-estate website, Zillow. (Screen Rant)

Apple has also said that they control product placement in movies. Often, you can tell what kind of phone an actor is using in a movie, but what kind of phones do villains use? Not iPhones, because the tech company does not want their products to be used by bad characters on screen, according to director Rian Johnson. (The Guardian) Apple says that their products should only be shown “in the best light, in a manner or context that reflects favorably on the Apple products and on Apple Inc.” (Apple)

The Future of Product Placement

Until now, product placement has been chosen specifically for each movie or TV show. However, that will soon be changing. Ryff is a company that has started a new way to do product placement. They say they have a platform that “integrates 3D models into popular entertainment.” The technology will allow producers to insert any product in real time. For now, targeted advertising is based on broad demographics, but in the future, they could be geared to each person individually. An example that CBC uses is that a meat-eater watching a movie might see someone cooking a steak while a vegan watching the same movie might see fruits and vegetables in a kitchen scene (CBC).

The technology will remove the ‘guesswork’ from the advertising. If producers can insert any product, specifically chosen for one demographic, they know if would be culturally relevant. They have drawn the line at putting new products in classic movies. For example, Roy Taylor, founder and CEO of Ryff, said that “just because you can doesn’t mean you should,” when asked if viewers might see E.T eating a new flavor of M&Ms instead of his famous Reese’s Pieces. (CBC) 

Overall, I think product placement is very interesting. I love seeing the Folgers coffee in every Hallmark movie, or the Frozen 2 stickers on apple juice. Each brand has to decide how they want people to see their products, and product placement is a great way to do that. It gives viewers the chance to see a character they love use the newest phone or eat at their favorite restaurant. Product placement will only get more interesting to me when producers start using the Ryff technology more, because it would be different for everyone. I can’t wait to see how they use their technology to cater to so many different demographics all at the same time.