New Line Cinema: Stop Your SoaP Griping!

New Line Cinema's apparent disappointment with the box office take of Snakes on A Plane shows they have missed the point of WOM.

Since everyone else in the blogosphere has written a post about SoaP, I have restrained myself. Until I saw this article in the New York Times with the headline "Snakes: A Letdown After Hype on the Web." The following facts in the article pushed me over the edge:

• "The film was still the No. 1 draw at the box office during the weekend."
• "It basically performed like a normal horror movie." said David Tuckerman, president for theatrical distribution for New Line.
• The article notes they only spent $20 million on marketing
• Box office was $15.2 million on the opening weekend.

So let me get this right -- New Line spent about half the marketing budget they normally would ( Hollywood Reporter notes $36.5 million is average), drove the same amount of revenue they would expect from this type of movie, and still grabbed the #1 slot for the weekend.

And they're disappointed?

They make a consciously low-budget, B-movie and are surprised when the alchemy of WOM doesn't turn this lead into gold. Duh!

Count your profits, go home, and plan the WOM campaign for your next movie! (and fire half of your marketing staff since you don't need them anymore).

work of mouth new line cinema Snakes on A Plane