3 brands and 3 surprises Product placement came onto the scene in the 1930’s with the placement of White Owl Cigars, received a lift in the 1980’s with Tom Hanks wearing Ray Ban sunglasses in a number of movies and has continues to grow – particularly in movies and on television ever since. In movies […]

3 brands and 3 surprises Product placement came onto the scene in the 1930’s with the placement of White Owl Cigars, received a lift in the 1980’s with Tom Hanks wearing Ray Ban sunglasses in a number of movies and has continues to grow – particularly in movies and on television ever since. In movies and television today product placement can be used to cover 15% of production costs and for movies advertisers can may as much as $100 million. The question is – does it work? A number of studies have examined this issue. Among them was a study by Martin Lindstrom in the early 2000s. This study looked at a series of the programme American Idol in which there were three principal advertisers: Ford Coke Cingular Wireless. Ford placed advertising without product placement while Coke and Cingular Wireless both advertised and engaged in product placement. There were of…