A $150 million box office can make even a monster appealing. Universal’s The Mummy was certainly not a can’t-miss film property when it hit theaters on May 7. While many other studios held back their major releases until after the Star Wars marketing machine blasted off on May 19, Universal gambled that moviegoers might want a little action-adventure warm-up. But would-be promotional partners were scared off by The Phantom Menace, leaving Universal to market the movie solo.
No matter. Universal’s strategy was a winner, and The Mummy earned $43 million-plus its first weekend and an impressive $13.8 million in its first weekend of competition with Star Wars. That success had partners climbing out of their sarcophagi.
Not wanting to lose any momentum, Universal announced its home-video marketing plans in June with The Mummy still selling tickets. The program’s highlights include:
Hershey Foods drops a 53 million-piece FSI offering IRCs for candy and videos on Oct. 10, 12 days after the video’s release (but closer to the all-important Halloween selling season). It pitches a buy-two-get-one-free candy deal in videocassettes of The Mummy and Alvin and the Chipmunks Meet Frankenstein, a direct-to-video title that will ride The Mummy’s coattails into retail, and will distribute more than 100,000 P-O-P displays.
Cambridge, MA-based Polaroid Corp. offers a $10 rebate on Polaroid OneStep Cameras in the videos, which it will tout on one million instant-film packs.
Both partners join with Universal on The Mummy’s Gold Sweepstakes, with a grand prize of $100,000 in gold and 100 first prizes of cameras and film.
That should cause enough commotion to raise the dead.
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