Par for the course. My stupid and tragic tale of trying to acquire a TFA movie poster. Kids, let Grandpa Dave spin a yarn.
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Back in 1998-2005 (the old days) - in the days of LucasFilm and ShopStarWars.com, a new Star Wars movie would be in the works. Excitement would build. Articles would be written. Fanboys would speculate and salivate. A trailer would be shown in the theaters accompanied by the release of a "teaser movie poster". Interested consumers would go to ShopStarWars.com and buy the teaser poster for $20 plus shipping. The transaction would take a few minutes and a week later a poster would arrive at your door. The same would be true of the theatrical release and the theatrical poster. Five minutes of online shopping, $20, and one week later UPS would leave it at your door while you tended to other things.
Spring forward to 2015 and the days of Disney running the commercial operation. New movies would be in the works. Fanboys would salivate. Yet there would be no way to purchase either a teaser poster nor a theatrical poster other than cheap downsized reprints.
A few fast acting people would be able to acquire these posters, but
only through Disney's movie rewards program. Quantities were very limited, so you better act fast.
"What is Disney Movie Rewards", you might ask? Its a loyalty program for people that buy Disney DVDs. You might also ask, "Why is that the only sales channel available to get a movie poster. Shouldn't these be available at Disney parks, or Disney stores in the mall, or maybe even Disney.com?" "Why should I have to buy ten copies of Air Bud to get a Star Wars movie poster"? All good questions. Perhaps the Hasbro team responsible for choosing figures to make that never appear in the movie might have lent some help in making these genius decisions.
So kids, Grandpa Dave has spent probably upwards of 80 hours trying to get the theatrical release of this movie poster. His old bones weren't quick enough in getting ten copies of Air Bud before all the posters were gone (seriously, anybody need a few copies of Air Bud?). He spent hours driving across town twice on movie premier day because a local theater was supposed to be selling posters that turned out to be small one sided copies for $25. He as Googled, and searched online, and logged in DisneyMovieRewards.com daily for four months trying to get a poster. He has made countless bids on eBay only to lose out to people willing to drop upwards of $100 to acquire these posters. No luck.
Well, after all this he finally managed to "win" an auction on eBay for the theatrical poster (he is still looking for a teaser poster) for $100 on Tuesday. Thanks to USPS the poster tube arrived with a giant spot caved in. Thank you for a $100 creased poster.
If you're doing the math. Old days - 5 minutes and $20. These days - 80 hours and $150 ($100 for the poster and $50 for ten copies of Air Bud).
And then today, Friday, out of force of habit Grandpa Dave checked DisneyMovieRewards.com, and for the price of ten Air Bud movies I can now get a The Force Awakens movie poster.
To Bob Iger, and the leadership at Disney - may a real (not animated mouse) crap in your bowl of Cheerios tomorrow morning.
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I know its way too long, but I just had to vent.
