Disney's lack of advertising

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Van

SatelliteGuys Master
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Jul 8, 2004
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I make no secret of it that I am a big fan of Japanese anime having grown of with Voltron defender of the universe and all of the Macros series on tv over several years and a leap to theatrical with Akira when I was 18. That being said I first learned of Studio Ghibli movies in 97 with a smuggled fan dub of Princess Mononoke that was shown at an anime club that I belonged to when I was living in Michigan. A few years later Disney picked up on the idea of a partnership with the studio and began releasing several of the movies in the states and other countries which is a good thing but something about their lack of advertising bothers me.

Disney has its hands in several different area's and this is one that would do them well to manage their investment dollars more wisely when they release the movies from Ghibli to theaters before dvd and then when out on dvd. Take for instance this past summers release of Ponyo in US theaters. The advertising for this film was so slight that unless you were on industry sites and emails for anime you would have most likely missed the very few commercials that were actually run on ABC stations. Previous movies like Howl's Moving Castle - The Official Web Site went to theater but I never saw a commercial for it or any advertising and didn't know about it until it had went to dvd, again a lack of advertising.

It seems to me that Disney is even lax on its advertising for its own studio productions over the last few years as compared to the media blitz they used to do such as with Toy Story, kinda makes you think that they're getting away from movies and shifting focus to other ventures.
 
Becuase with Toy Story they were banking on making 100+million $s... With these Anime films, they know that its a "cult" following and the mainstream does not care about it. So they focus there advertising only on that audience, through anime type websites and through word of mouth etc.
 
This must be a first. Somebody complaining about too few ads. :D
 
At one time you could say that anime had a cult status but anymore its becoming a mainstream form of entertainment and a good portion of the toons that kids through to adults watch on tv are anime with Naruto being the current mainstream favorite.

I had no idea about Kimba, I'll have to see if I can find a copy of it to compare. Still though I have noticed that the drop in advertising has not just been with the Ghibli line but also with Disney's own studio's as compared to what it used to be so maybe it has to do with financial issues within the company or a shift in priorities but either way today's Disney is a shadow of what it once was it seems.
 
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