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Product placement is a promotional tactic used by marketers in which a real commercial product is used in fictional or non-fictional media, and the presence of the product is a result of an economic exchange. When featuring a product is not part of an economic exchange, it is called a product plug. Product placement appears in plays, film, television series, music videos, video games and books. It became more common starting in the 1980s, but can be traced back to at least 1949. Product placement occurs with the inclusion of a brand's logo, or a favorable mention or appearance of a product. This is done without disclosure, and under the premise that it is a natural part of the work. Most major movie releases today contain product placements.^[1] The most common form is movie and television placements and more recently computer and video games. Recently, Web 2.0 sites have experimented with in-site product placement as a revenue model.

A Coca Cola product placement on the space shuttle is a form of space advertising.

One of the best-known instances of product placement appeared in 1982 movie E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, which increased sales of Reese's Pieces 65 percent.^[1]

A very early example of product placement in film occurs in the 1949 film Love Happy, in which Harpo Marx cavorts on a rooftop among various billboards and at one point escapes from the villains on the old Mobil logo, the "Flying Red Horse".

Another very early example potentially occurs in Jules Verne's Around the World in Eighty Days in which transport and shipping companies lobbied to be mentioned as it was initially published in serial form.

Still another example is the conspicuous display of Studebaker motor vehicles in the television show Mr. Ed, which was sponsored by the Studebaker Corporation from 1961 to 1963.

Likely the earliest example of product placement in a computer or video game occurs in the 1984 game Action Biker for KP's Skips crisps.

Likely the earliest example of product placement in a cartoon occurs in the Comedy Central show: Shorties Watchin' Shorties.[1]

Other times, product usage is negotiated rather than paid for. Some placements provide productions with below-the-line savings, with products such as props, clothes and cars being loaned for the production's use, thereby saving them purchase or rental fees. Barter systems (the director/actor/producer wants one for himself) and service deals (cellular phones provided for crew use, for instance) are also common practices. Producers may also seek out companies for product placements as another savings or revenue stream for the movie, with, for example, products used in exchange for help funding advertisements tied-in with a film's release, a show's new season or other event.

The most common products to be promoted in this way are automobiles. Frequently, all the important vehicles in a movie or television serial will be supplied by one manufacturer. For example, The X-Files used Fords, as do leading characters on 24. The James Bond films pioneered such placement.^[2] The 1974 film The Man with the Golden Gun featured extensive use of AMC cars, even in scenes in Thailand, where AMC cars were not sold, and had the steering wheel on the wrong side of the vehicle for the country's roads. Other times, vehicles or other products take on such key roles in the film it is as if they are another character. Examples of this practice include Bad Boys 2, in which every car was made by General Motors. In Desperate Housewives three of the characters drive Nissans, and the camera view often focuses on the Nissan symbol on someone's car. Also the character Gabrielle Solis can also be seen driving an Aston Martin DB9 Volante prominently.

More recently, Apple Computer frequently places its products in films and on television, where they therefore seem much more common than in most real-world offices and homes. Apple has recently stated that it does not pay for product placement, though executives will not say how their products get into movies and onto TV. The most plausible argument may be that Apple computers appear to be more visually appealing than ordinary PCs. (Notably, recognizable Apple products have appeared in newspaper comic strips, including Opus, Baby Blues, Non Sequitur, and FoxTrot, even though paid placement in comics is all but unknown.) In a twist on traditional product placement, Hewlett-Packard computers now appear exclusively as part of photo layouts in the IKEA catalog in addition to placing plastic models of its computers in IKEA stores, having taken over Apple's position in the Swedish furniture retailer's promotional materials several years ago. Hewlett-Packard also put their computers in the US production of The Office, though it is likely that this was a purposeful choice, since offices rarely have Macintosh computers.

A variant of product placement is advertisement placement. In this case an advertisement for the product (rather than the product itself) is seen in the movie or television series. Examples include a Lucky Strike cigarette advertisement on a billboard or a truck with a milk advertisement on its trailer.

Product placement is also used in books (particularly novels) and video games, such as Crazy Taxi, which featured numerous real retail stores as game destinations. However, sometimes the economics are reversed, and video game makers pay for the rights to use real sports teams and players.

Quantification methods track brand integrations, with both basic quantitative and more demonstrative qualitative systems used to determine the cost and effective media value of a placement. Rating systems measure the type of placement and on-screen exposure is gauged by audience recall rates. Products might be featured but hardly identifiable, clearly identifiable, long or recurrent in exposure, associated with a main character, verbally mentioned and/or they may play a key role in the storyline. Media values are also weighed over time, depending on a specific product's degree of presence in the market.

Product placement can be seen as a modern version of the exhibit displays seen at world's fairs, concerts, sporting events, or anywhere that large numbers of potential customers gathered.

Virtual product placement uses computer graphics to insert the product into the program after the program is complete.[2][3]

The film The Truman Show explores the idea of a 24-hour on-air reality television program funded entirely by product placement.

The pilot episode of the NBC sitcom 30 Rock prominently featured General Electric's Trivection oven, which many people believed was an example of product placement.[4] However, Tina Fey, the show's creator, stated in an interview that the oven was included purely as a joke,[5] although this didn't stop GE from running ads for the oven during the commercial break. Allison Eckelkamp, a spokesperson for GE, said that GE chose to do this to make sure viewers knew it was a real product.[6]

The James Bond film Licence to Kill featured use of the Lark brand of cigarette, and the producers accepted payment for that product placement. The studio's executives apparently believed that the placement triggered the American warning notice requirement for cigarette advertisements and thus the picture carried the Surgeon General's Warning at the end credits of the film. This brought forth calls for banning such cigarette advertisements in future films.

Some consumer groups such as Commercial Alert object to product placement as "an affront to basic honesty",[7] which they claim is too common in today's society. Commercial Alert asks for full disclosure of all product placement arrangements, arguing that most product placements are deceptive and not clearly disclosed. They advocate notification before and during television programs with embedded advertisements. One justification for this is to allow greater parental control for children, whom they claim are easily influenced by product placement.

The film Minority Report, loosely based on the Philip K. Dick short story of the same name, makes heavy use of product placement, including Coca-Cola, Gap, and Lexus. Director Steven Spielberg also uses one scene to criticize advertising: the main character (Tom Cruise) is harassed by personalised advertisements calling out his own name. The film Fight Club, directed by David Fincher, bit the hand that fed it by depicting acts of violence against most of the products that paid to be placed in the film. Examples include the scene where the Apple Store is broken into, and the scene in which Brad Pitt and Edward Norton smash the headlights of a new Volkswagen Beetle. The comedy film Kung Pow! Enter the Fist also attempted to spoof its product placements, clearly pointing out the anachronistic inclusion of a Taco Bell in the film.

2004's Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle was one of the first films to be completely centered around a product or product retail store. The White Castle fast food chain, though very regional, enjoyed a high rise in exposure when the film was released.^{[citation needed]} The story centers around two stoners who attempt to track down a White Castle.

The film I, Robot, loosely based on the story collection by Isaac Asimov, makes heavy use of product placements for sports shoes, automobile, and hi-fi companies among others. The film was subject to negative criticism[8] as a result, being ranked as the #1 worst film for product placement on one site.[9]

The film The Island, directed by Michael Bay, features at least 21 individual products or brands, including cars, bottled water, shoes, credit cards, beer, and ice cream.^[3] The film was highly criticized for this.^[4]

The film Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby, directed by Adam McKay, also contained a high amount of product placement. Characters repeatedly mention brands under the guise of NASCAR sponsorship. The movie contains possibly the first instance of an actual television commercial in a movie.^[5]

The television show South Park has also used product placements during episodes in its tenth season. Franchise restaurant P.F. Chang's was featured prominently in the episode "A Million Little Fibers" without being mocked in any fashion. "Cartoon Wars Part I" showed the character Eric Cartman packing Dr Pepper alongside the fictional Cheesy Poofs in a methodical fashion. The Nintendo Wii played a pivotal role in a two part episode in 2006. Finally, the episode "Make Love, not Warcraft" revolves entirely around the popular MMORPG, World of Warcraft.

Some filmmakers have responded to product placement by creating false products that frequently appear in the movies they make. Some examples:

• Kevin Smith - Nails Cigarettes, Mooby Corporation, Chewlees Gum, Discreeto Burritos
• Quentin Tarantino - Red Apple Cigarettes, Big Kahuna Burger, Jack Rabbit Slim's Restaurants
• Robert Rodriguez - Chango Beer
• Pixar Animation Studios - Pizza Planet

This practice is also fairly common in certain comics, such as Svetlana Chmakova's Dramacon, which makes several product-placement-esque usages of "Pawky", (a modification of the name of the Japanese sweet "Pocky", popular among the anime and manga fan community in which the story is set) or Naoko Takeuchi's Sailor Moon, which includes numerous references to the series Codename: Sailor V which Sailor Moon was spun off of; the anime makes further use of this meta-referential gag, going so far as having an animator on a Codename: Sailor V feature film be a victim in one episode.

This practice is also common in certain "reality-based" video games such as the Grand Theft Auto series which feature fictitious stores such as Ammu-Nation, Vinyl Countdown, Gash (spoofing Gap), Pizza Boy, etc.

In the 1984 cult film Repo Man, a reverse form of product placement is used, with an exaggerated form of 1980's era generic packaging used on products prominently shown on-screen (these include "Beer", "Drink", "Dry Gin" and "Food - Meat Flavored"). Reportedly, this was done out on necessity after an intended advertiser, who was to have used product placement, backed out in mid-production.

• Morley, a fictional brand of cigarettes used in movies and TV
• Kmart realism - product placement for cultural familiarity
• Parody advertisement
• Publicity
• Undercover marketing
• Cross media marketing
• Advertising
• False advertising
• Advertiser funded programming
• Namechecking
• ad creep

1. ^ ^{a b} Solomon. Zaichkowsky, Polegato.Consumer Behaviour Pearson, Toronto. 2005
2. ^ Nadja Tata: "Product Placement in James-Bond-Filmen". Saarbrücken 2006 - ISBN 3-86550-440-X
3. ^ Numsum.com Partial list of product placements in The Island. Retrieved March 8, 2007.
4. ^ Advertisingindustrynewswire.com Criticism of product placements in The Island. Retrieved March 8, 2007.
5. ^ Themoviespoiler.com Plot, product placements. Retrieved March 23, 2007.