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The movie went on to amass more than $821 million worldwide. The sequel surprisingly grossed slightly less ($783 million) than the first one but was nevertheless a box office success. These numbers are mind boggling and Sony Pictures are definitely sitting on a franchise heaven. But the success of these movies emboldened them to throw oodles of cash in the production of the third episode of Spidey tales. Spiderman 3 reportedly cost almost $500 million including marketing and promotion costs. Whoa! Although the success of this movie is almost a given and Sony will definitely recover its investment, $500 million seems a bit too much to throw at a 2-hour flick. The management of the movie’s shooting was in total mess and the movie ran months off schedule. But I guess all will be forgotten when the movie turns a profit.
Apart from relying on box office receipts and DVD sales, how will Sony recover its costs? Through merchandizing, of course. Spiderman is a product that is easily marketable to kids and even geeks. Sony is pulling out all stops to market the movie and harness Spiderman’s merchandising power. Couple of weeks back I got this email from Amazon:
Now who could resist that awesome stuffed toy, rock-on pose and all. But that’s not all. Sony is leveraging the Spiderman brand in almost all forms - board games, graphic novels, video games, soundtrack album, toys, comic books, etc. Note the not-so-subtle “Shop Now.” Take a look at the various options that Amazon offers to help Sony recover its colossal investment:
I am sure Sony will have no problem recovering its money but I hope its free-spending ways doesn’t spread to its other movies where chances of recovery might not be assured. After all, big spending is a habit hard to lose.
by Patrix | on Monday, April 30th, 2007 at 6:22 pm | 
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April 30th, 2007 at 6:34 pm reply
Well, the spidey toy is a little freakish.. dont know if I’d buy it..and is my imagination or is toy Spidey a..ahem ..little person?
BTW, my acceptance speech.. :)
am waiting for ash’s comment on this one >:)
April 30th, 2007 at 6:47 pm reply
Sqrl, freaky? Well, at least it isn’t as freaky as the ‘Tiddy Bear’ :)
April 30th, 2007 at 10:36 pm reply
[Patrix]
After a hiatus, here comes the deluge of posts! (Tempted to use the ‘lull before the storm’ analogy here) Anyway, I can’t wait for Spiderman-3.
Btw, that tiddy bear was hilarious. Another one of those classic infomercials on TV. I wonder how people manage to manufacture ways to make your life appear ‘easier/better’ than it currently is.
April 30th, 2007 at 11:28 pm reply
Piker, the unfortunate part about this blog has been the sporadic manner in which content is updated. But I guess, it will do for now.
Trust the ‘innovators’ to think of ways to make your life easier even when you think it is easy enough.
May 2nd, 2007 at 7:29 am reply
:O @ tiddy bear..is that even real?! I wonder if the manufacturer inserted some kind of wireless hidden camera in it…
May 2nd, 2007 at 10:49 am reply
Sqrl, trust me there is a market for even the weird stuff. Check eBay’s listings for a small sprinkling :)
May 8th, 2007 at 10:41 am reply
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