MonKeyArtAwards

Thinking Inside The Big Box

We’re picking up some chatter lately that a certain shop, known for having established an all-in rate sheet with Paramount, is looking to replicate that formula with other studios and cable companies. 

Using Wal-Mart's business model of selling in volume at "always low prices" could work for some of the bigger houses as a way to secure business amidst the studios' greedy budget squeeze. But, in the same way that mom & pop stores can’t compete with that retail behemoth, we wonder where this trend will leave some of the smaller agencies - or, as they like to fancy themselves, "creative boutiques". 

And, more importantly, will account execs now be designated as "greeters"?

Would You Like Fries With That? Paramount Combos Theatrical Creative With Home Entertainment

If you’re like us, you Googled Goliger this morning after hearing that more staffers were found in Paramount’s dumpster over the weekend, victims of yet another round of studio profit squeezing. 

And yet, the cruelest fate is for those theatrical execs who avoided the axe, but now must hold their noses as they wade through that mandatory crapfest of logos and mousetype on the backs of all those DVD packages.

According to Nikki Finke, the dumpster count stands at seven: four from home entertainment, three from theatrical. 

 
But wait, there's more! Sony, too, continues to collapse its marketing divisions in the wake of diminishing returns for home entertainment.

Left Behind

Variety tells us that this summer is the highest-grossing summer ever in the history of domestic box office. And all those fired studio execs? Maybe they really were just a layer of expendable, inert gas after all.

There Are No Small Claims, Only Small Clients

One of the many rat bastard freelancers we count among our readers sent us this link to a WSJ article titled Freelancers’ Guide to Getting Paid—on Time. 

It offers up some handy tips ranging from making up a phantom accountant to blame for your hectoring to just going ahead and suing their cheap, pinchfisted asses in small claims court.

Do I Dare Disturb The Universe?

Dear Edwina,

May I suggest a burning subject for your column: Money.

How much are we getting paid?

Is a freelancer making more than a staff AD?

How much is an agent getting from an AD they place?

None of my collegues would answer my questions, but I'm thinking maybe they'll answer yours....

... I so look forward to it!

Signed, A Down To Earth AD.

If you're like us, you know any discussion of salaries is the third rail of entertainment advertising. And yet, because of the anonymous habitat we have created here at MonKeyArtAwards, we have had several requests like the one above.

We know that many of our readers fancy themselves to be professionals and not mere tradespeople, thus putting themselves in the unfortunate position of having to guess what their esteemed colleagues are earning, unlike union workers whose pay is based on a wage scale and therefore know exactly what the person toiling along side them makes an hour.

Given the present economic climate, if you believe any discussion of compensation, anonymous or otherwise, will work to your advantage you are mistaken.

However bad you may hear the labor market is, it's worse than you think. If you are employed, if you are busy, if you have a solid client base whose positions are secure, consider yourself fortunate.

How Low Will They Go?

The New York Times writes about Orbitz’s move to entertainment advertising juggernaut Trailer Park, which is owned by Lake Capital.

Jeffrey Davidoff, Orbitz’s chief marketing officer, said this about the switch: “One of the things we’re going after is how low is low.” 

We hasten to add that Mr. Davidoff   

was referring to costs, not taste.

A Ray Of Less Expensive Sunshine In Entertainment Advertising

One of our readers sent us this Adweak link announcing Orbitz has moved its creative biz to Trailer Park, calling it a less expensive alternative to Mullen. 

Hung Out To Dry

If you’re like us, you know without a doubt that your esteemed colleagues stand behind you. So far behind you that you can’t even see them. 

Which is why we think things might play out like this: 

1. The brother and sisterhood of the AEMA is formed in order to “collect and make available… economic data and other similar information.” Which is to say they get together and pitch a collective fit about how they’re all getting hosed by the studios. 

2. Members take a blood oath to stand together against the oppression and injustice heaped on them by tyrannical studio marketing execs. 

3. “The Vendor Client Relationship” video is posted anonymously on YouTube. 

4. Nikki Finke’s Deadline Hollywood (which is a must-read for ALL studio marketing execs) runs the video and reports: “Even though he didn't make this video, the president of the Association of Entertainment Marketing Agencies is sending it around to trailer houses.” 

5. Studio marketing execs have their assistants access the Internet to determine who is the president of AEMA. 

6. Pissed off studio execs pull jobs from El Presidente's trailer house, thus alarming the other members. 

7. Panic stricken, they renounce El Presidente and make a mad scramble to pick up those jobs -- at whatever price the studios are willing to pay.

Econ 101

We have no axe to grind here at MonKeyartAwards, only a big, ol' wooden spoon we like to use to stir up the rabble.

But let's face it, boys and girls, things are bad all over, not just on Wilshire Blvd. It’s all too common for a company to have cash flow problems these days. Despite big box office returns, the studios are taking advantage of a rotten economy to lowball already reduced budgets and stall on payments. And this trickles right on down to the bottom of the barrel - which is where freelancers live. 

An over-extended company is going to pay the rent and meet payroll first before it pays outside vendors. But, since freelancers carry rumors the way rats carry fleas, an agency puts its reputation on the line when it burns a freelancer. 

So, for your own sake, pay those rat bastard freelancers!

To Be Sold & Let By Public Auction

If you’re like us, you’ve always dreamed of owning your own human. So imagine our jubilation when one of our readers tipped us off that Crispin Porter + Bogusky, the advertising agency that prides itself on being a factory, is auctioning off its interns on eBay. 

Bidding is for three months of indentured servitude, but be sure to read the fine print: The seller will not accept returns for this item and will arrange for local pickup only, no shipping.

Pushing Pixels Across The Border

One of the many life-wasting pixel pushers we count among our readers writes to tell us that his/her “panties are bunched up to hell” over the news that Disney Pixar is opening a studio in Canada. 

“Lord knows, there’s no one in L.A. who could do any of the work,” our reader writes. “Further evidence that the Mouse is evil.” 

Perhaps it is the discomfort caused by one's panties that makes one judge the situation so harshly. Outsourcing of jobs and corporation tax avoidance is as American as apple pie and Mickey Mouse. 

Which is why we moved MonKeyArtAwards to the former Union Carbide plant here in Bhopal, India. Not only do we take rapacious advantage of the cheap talent pool, but also the current U.S. laws, which allow us to bring home foreign profits taxed at a mere 5.25%.

Brace Yourselves, Marketeers!

The Hollywood Reporter reports that president and CEO Bob Iger blames the film studio for Disney's poor 2nd quarter performance. 

Iger, America's 3rd highest paid CEO, says he will "address costs virtually at every level" in the film studio, where income tanked 97%. Duck and cover, people: the axe is being sharpened for the beloved Mickey Mouse Marketeers Club.

It's A World Of Laughter, A World Of Tears

Walt Disney Company CEO Bob Iger, who “earned” a $13.9 million bonus in 2008, just cut another 1,900 jobs at The Happiest Place on Earth (1,200 people and 700 empty positions at the U.S. theme parks) bringing the Disney dumpster up to a grand total up to 3,100 laid off employees.

MGM: The Zombie Studio

If you’re like us, you didn’t think there was anyone left at MGM to fire. But, according to DHD, it looks like they managed to dig up a few corpses and re-assign them to the dumpster.  

Bad News Followed By Tragic News Followed By Some Good News Followed By More Bad News

If you’re like us, you know the best place to ogle the latest DVD key art is the dump bin next to the checkout counter at Albertsons. But, even with movies being sold like toothpaste, last year’s fourth quarter, which is usually the big, fat one for DVD sales, saw revenue from sell-through fall 23.4 percent.

More folks are opting to rent rather than buy, and the studios are pocketing only a paltry share of those rental dollars. Adding insult to job insecurity, most of those rented DVDs come wrapped in one of those ubiquitous red envelopes, with our precious key art assigned the lowly position of the disc label… with a hole in the middle of it! And now, the final horror is upon us as films begin streaming into homes unaccompanied by any key art at all. 

On a happier note, attendance at movie theatres is up by nearly 16 percent. And if that upswing continues, not only will this be the box-office’s biggest surge in twenty years, it will also be a sure indication that the studios can get along quite nicely without all those mid-level execs that got canned.

NAPTE Headed Woes

Adweak says all bets are off on the future of our country's best and brightest TV program executrixes annual group grope after NAPTE's less-than-fabulous week in Las Vegas.