Star Wars marketing at an all time high

movies of all time. star wars — the force awakens — opens in theaters across the u.s. tomorrow. from a galaxy far, far away … to our t.v. screens. americans are being bombarded with star wars products thanks to a marketing strategy we haven’t seen before: abc-7’s jerry najera joins us live to explain. rick estela you can’t turn a corner without seeing something related to star wars turn on the t.v., the radio, social media it’s all about the force … a force of marketing that is. it started back in 19-77 when stars wars first hit the big screen and comemrcials like these hit the small screen do you remember this comercial for darth vader figures? … princess leia dolls? .. and the then high- tech remote controlled r2d2’s. by the year 20-12, marketing for the blockbuster entered a whole new world. you could find yoda fighting for brisk tea or a boy dressed as darth vader starting his dad’s car thanks to the force. “the star wars build up has bee one of the biggest ones i can rember” roland gau is an assitant proffesor of marketing for utep. he tells me the marketing-is pushing a little something for everyone. even cover girl is jumping on star wars bandwagon “this ide that star wars was a science fiction franchise for the geeks but now it’s pushing towards everybody. you want to get kids involved you want to get male and females involved” gau tells me star wars has one advantage over other movies when it comes to marketing. its story and characters appeal to several generations of americans. “if you were born in the late 50’s you would have had star wars coming up in your formidable years and some of those consumers are getting to be 60-years-old now” the film’s marketing budget, which could reach into the hundreds of millions, also helps according to gau. ” rule of thumb is a movie costs a hundred million dollars to make they spend another hundred million dollars in marketing” but how much is too much? “as far as marketers, we’re giving the people what they want but we do have to have some scruples about it we do need to think about the ethics behind things and we’re doing things in a smart sustainable way” analysts say there’s a good chance products with the star wars logo and images will generate three billion dollars this year and five more billion next year. an el paso couple may not have time to go the movies right