In 1975, Clairol is a personal-care-product division of Procter & Gamble apparently paid US $10,000 to have its goods appear in Michael Ritchie’s film Smile. Ten years later, the California Raisin Board is thought to have paid US$25,000 dollars to be seen in Robert Zemeckis’s Back to the Future in 1985. In 1992, France Télécom apparently disbursed €450,000 for a divine telephone call in Claude Lelouch’s La Belle Histoire. Ford apparently had to out-bid BMW by several million dollars to see an Aston Martin reappear in the adventures of James Bond, in Die Another Day in 2002 [6, p.119]. In the final account, however, these prices have no meaning. The price of a placement is impossible to determine in absolute terms, at the risk of falling into the deepest incoherence. At one end of the scale, a sum is paid by the studio to the brand for some placements, because the screenplay requires a certain specific, and indispensable, prop or product. This was the case, for example, for access to a high-speed train from the French national rail company in Mission: Impossible. In the middle of the scale, there is no payment but simply provision of goods by the brand, as with Virgin Cola in the film La Boite [6, p.199]. At the other end of the scale, certain very favourable placements, planned for very large productions, can represent an investment of several million dollars for a brand wishing to participate in the project. To establish an average would not be very relevant when there is such variation.
It is therefore not possible to give exact prices for a standard placement, given that there simply is no standard placement. However, the following mathematical formula is often quoted by certain experts: if initially a classic visual placement costs X dollars, the same placement with the spoken mention of the brand name will cost on average twice X dollars. As for the same placement, but with the product being used by one of the actors, it is safe to assume on average three times X dollars. However, this rule is not so much simple as simplistic: these same experts are often incapable of providing a precise calculation method, because the price will depend on so many variables.
Furthermore, the figures given in the press are often overall sums: this allows the media to exploit the shock effect. In reality, these sums bring together numerous items that are complementary, but differ widely one from the other, and are not necessarily linked to the placement itself. It may be a question of a logistical service, of a contribution in kind of products and props required for filming, for example: computers, cars, jewellery, audiovisual equipment and so on, of preferential conditions for a loan of materials, of tie-in advertising when the film is released, and other issues. The multiple meetings carried out for this book with placement professionals brought to light that among the principal elements influencing the price are the factors listed below. Naturally, the disclosure of a possible surcharge should be considered, all other factors being otherwise constant and comparable.
