Disney (and others) at the Box Office - Current State of Affairs

[Disney Irish]

Are deadline’s numbers based on just box office or box office plus all the other stuff that comes later (digital sales and whatnot)?

It includes both, but that is the whole point as the box office is not the complete picture of a movies earnings. But I understand that some only care about the box office, for reasons.

I’ve long heard that marketing costs can be reasonably estimated at half of the budget for major movies. We’re saying it’s now 25%?

This has been discussed here before. But the marketing costs for a movie aren't fixed to only theatrical, ie the half the budget calculation, its actually marketing for theatrical AND all other distribution including digital/streaming, etc., for post-theatrical, ie they don't just have a separate budget for just that. So only about 25% or so (on average) of a budget or about half of the total marketing budget is actually associated with the marketing during the theatrical space. So if you're really wanting to ONLY calculate profitability during theatrical and don't care about the rest then you should only count 25% for just the marketing cost during theatrical.

 

[BrianLo]

I’ve long heard that marketing costs can be reasonably estimated at half of the budget for major movies. We’re saying it’s now 25%?

Marketing isn’t strictly spent in the theatrical window. If the backend needs to be ignored entirely, I proposed not counting the money temporally spent in the backend. Hence halving it in the profit equations.


The actual answer is even more complicated, we are terrible at predicting marketing and usually undershoot. A portion of production is already paid for by back end deals etc etc etc.

But I hope that makes some logical sense. It was my best mea culpa proposal. Don’t count commercials for whatever is coming out on D+ if you don’t want to consider D+ earnings.

 

[BrianLo]

Watching a trailer on youtube is passive and free. Going to a theater requires energy, time and money.

Views on trailers rarely correlates to box office.

Oh absolutely. I think it’s very, very weak. But when they post 300M+ and break prior trailer records, it at least vaguely indicates some interest. I think Snow represents what was ultimately that passive floor and Deadpool indicates excitement.

I just made note that the trailer releases that actually have broken records recently were Deadpool and Wolverine, Moana and Inside Out 2. Clearly there was some indicators of a possibly excited audience.

Marvel Studios' 'Deadpool & Wolverine' Trailer Smashes Record for Most Views of All Time - The Walt Disney Company

Marvel Studios’ highly anticipated trailer for "Deadpool & Wolverine" broke global records following its release on Sunday.

thewaltdisneycompany.com

'Moana 2' Sets a Record as Disney's Biggest Animated Trailer Launch in History - The Walt Disney Company

There’s just no telling how far she’ll go. On Wednesday, Walt Disney Animation Studios debuted the teaser trailer for the highly anticipated feature film Moana …Read More

thewaltdisneycompany.com

‘Inside Out 2’ Garners Biggest Animated Trailer Launch in Disney History - The Walt Disney Company

On Thursday, Disney and Pixar debuted the first look at the highly anticipated Inside Out 2, and excitement over the new film was felt everywhere.

thewaltdisneycompany.com

Basically when we get one of these corporate shout outs, there seems to be strong early readings. NOT a one off shout out from the lead actress.

Incidentally they have a corporate brag post on Stitch.

'Lilo & Stitch' Trailer Sets Record as Second Most Viewed Disney Live-Action Trailer of All Time - The Walt Disney Company

The launch of the trailer for "Lilo & Stitch" was a huge success, becoming the second most viewed Disney live-action trailer of all time.

thewaltdisneycompany.com

 

[BrianLo]

The other factor to remember is takes a huge blockbuster to offset a movie like Snow White (that loses $200+ million).

Since Disney only gets (roughly) half the theater revenue it takes a huge hit to make up for every loser, with Disney budgets often $200 million + another 50% for marketing something else has to make a billion + just for Disney to make up for a different films $200m loss.

If you’re only release of handful of films a year you really can’t afford to have massive flops because there (often) aren’t enough blockbusters to make up for those massive losses.

Sorry I’m catching up. I enjoy your presence and hope you won’t leave, I’m not after preaching exclusively to a choir.

A little while ago I went over the last 15 years and pointed out how a 9 figure bomb like Snow White is the common thread. It occurs most years and many times a couple times. Particularly in a prior decade that Disney was largely considered the runaway champion of. Corporate math is as complicated as we say and these things are more than made up for. The industry functions on throwing things on the fire and hoping a few explode. It’s the tentpole strategy.

We are talking about the box office and more specifically recently the conversation has been about who wins at the box office.

Maybe we need to start a second thread called the box office plus residuals, streaming, tv revenue, and ancillary products so those of us who want to discuss the box office can do that here and those who want to look at total revenue over the next several years can do that in a separate thread.

(Taps thread sign) Or just create your own thing like DA did!

This has never actually been the topic of the thread. Otherwise we’d present raw box office numbers and not try and splice profit. I think we all think raw box office is an incomplete story, or we’d be giving Disney a silver medal for 2023.

The resistance I might suggest merely comes out from really wanting to make the company look bad, nothing more. We absolutely can follow the numbers in real time.

The Snow White loss was already covered by the Q2 tails of Moana 2 and Mufasa. In fact, they posted a 153M studio profit despite the entire budgets and half the marketing spends hitting the books for Captain 4 (a wash) and Snow (a big loser).

 

[easyrowrdw]

Marketing isn’t strictly spent in the theatrical window. If the backend needs to be ignored entirely, I proposed not counting the money temporally spent in the backend. Hence halving it in the profit equations.


The actual answer is even more complicated, we are terrible at predicting marketing and usually undershoot. A portion of production is already paid for by back end deals etc etc etc.

But I hope that makes some logical sense. It was my best mea culpa proposal. Don’t count commercials for whatever is coming out on D+ if you don’t want to consider D+ earnings.

I guess that makes sense. But isn't a lot more spent on marketing for the theatrical run than the post-theater run? A 50/50 split doesn't seem to match at least what I've seen (just speaking personally) with movie marketing.

 

[easyrowrdw]

It includes both, but that is the whole point as the box office is not the complete picture of a movies earnings. But I understand that some only care about the box office, for reasons.

Okay. That would also explain the discrepancy between different people's calculations. I have no problem only considering the box office until there are actually #s to be known for the other stuff. If they haven't made that money yet I think it’s fine not to include it until they do.

 

[Disney Irish]

Okay. That would also explain the discrepancy between different people's calculations. I have no problem only considering the box office until there are actually #s to be known for the other stuff. If they haven't made that money yet I'm not personally going to include it.

I guess it comes down to one’s goal.

Because if one was really interested in a movies profit/loss toward a company with a mouse mascot I’d think one would be interested in the complete picture, rather than a snapshot in time that is meaningless toward the bottom line.

Otherwise the goal is just to make that same company look bad because they didn’t win the box office that week. I know that is some posters goal which is why the recent complaint is interesting because we’ve been discussing the entire picture number for the better part of a year now (and longer really thanks to @BrianLo).

 

[BrianLo]

I guess that makes sense. But isn't a lot more spent on marketing for the theatrical run than the post-theater run? A 50/50 split doesn't seem to match at least what I've seen (just speaking personally) with movie marketing.

Yup, the more complicated answer is 50% is the marketing floor, it’s way underestimated. We have absolutely zero validated tool to calculate marketing because it’s so highly elastic to how it does initially. I’ve seen a few case examples where it’s 40% and that’s largely on the rug pulls for very expensive films that fall out of the gate. When movies go big we often see marketing budgets pushing 80… 100%. The floor on Illumination films is usually more like 100%+. They save in production but spend like Disney-esque.

The continuation of that complicated figure is nearly all of the costs of a film beyond its production costs are already covered post theatrically. Contracts are already signed. So if you want to do 50% of marketing, you need to do 75% of production. Whatever way I can convince people to get to a meaningful number and away from a number that means kind of nothing.


The analogy of this argument is that only ticket sales for WDW ‘count’. But all the costs count. None of the hotel receipts, none of the food and beverage, none of the in park spend, none of the ticket add ons or LL.

Like… really… what’s the point in Including ALL of the costs and only one of the revenue streams if not to make the number look bad? We have a fairly validated rule now, we can track it in real time. I have yet to be presented with a logical argument other than silly things like it’s not in the title of the thread. Nor is the word movie profit in the title of the thread, but that’s all we collectively focus on.

The rule doesn’t make Snow White not bomb, nor IJ4, The Marvels, Haunted Mansion, Wish or Strange World. It’s not a sleight of hand.

 

[easyrowrdw]

I guess it comes down to one’s goal.

Because if one was really interested in a movies profit/loss toward a company with a mouse mascot I’d think one would be interested in the complete picture, rather than a snapshot in time that is meaningless toward the bottom line.

Otherwise the goal is just to make that same company look bad because they didn’t win the box office that week. I know that is some posters goal which is why the recent complaint is interesting because we’ve been discussing the entire picture number for the better part of a year now (and longer really thanks to @BrianLo).

I edited my comment (too late it seems). I agree that info is relevant. But I think it’s fine to wait until it’s actually earned to include it. And a snapshot isn’t meaningless. Opening weekend is a snapshot, for instance. They don’t tell everything of course

 

[easyrowrdw]

Yup, the more complicated answer is 50% is the marketing floor, it’s way underestimated. We have absolutely zero validated tool to calculate marketing because it’s so highly elastic to how it does initially. I’ve seen a few case examples where it’s 40% and that’s largely on the rug pulls for very expensive films that fall out of the gate. When movies go big we often see marketing budgets pushing 80… 100%. The floor on Illumination films is usually more like 100%+. They save in production but spend like Disney-esque.

The continuation of that complicated figure is nearly all of the costs of a film beyond its production costs are already covered post theatrically. Contracts are already signed. So if you want to do 50% of marketing, you need to do 75% of production. Whatever way I can convince people to get to a meaningful number and away from a number that means kind of nothing.


The analogy of this argument is that only ticket sales for WDW ‘count’. But all the costs count. None of the hotel receipts, none of the food and beverage, none of the in park spend, none of the ticket add ons or LL.

Like… really… what’s the point in Including ALL of the costs and only one of the revenue streams if not to make the number look bad? We have a fairly validated rule now, we can track it in real time. I have yet to be presented with a logical argument other than silly things like it’s not in the title of the thread. Nor is the word movie profit in the title of the thread, but that’s all we collectively focus on.

The rule doesn’t make Snow White not bomb, nor IJ4, The Marvels, Haunted Mansion, Wish or Strange World. It’s not a sleight of hand.

If the intent is to account for every single dollar that is ever made for a movie, then it’s inconsistent to only include the marketing costs for the theater run. If revenue is for the life of the movie, then all of the costs have to be also, not half of them. But that seems fine to me.

Or if you don’t want to consider all of the money that comes later (because it hasn’t been earned or reported yet) then sure try to figure out how much of marketing is just for the theater time. That feels largely futile though.* But I think it’s also fine to say here’s where it is now. When more info is obtained, we’ll update. I know you post the reports if/when they’re released. Otherwise it’s all spitballing.

*Either way, I still don’t see a particularly strong case for the theatrical marketing number being 25%. If 50% is likely an underestimate then using 25% for theaters is a severe underestimate.

 

[Disney Irish]

I edited my comment (too late it seems). I agree that info is relevant. But I think it’s fine to wait until it’s actually earned to include it. And a snapshot isn’t meaningless. Opening weekend is a snapshot, for instance. They don’t tell everything of course

A snapshot is meaningless, even opening weekend, especially when trying to use it to frame a narrative of success or failure and profit/loss, and use it to give a summary of the end of year totals, as several posters do here.

For example lets use a recent example of Mufasa, if you went based it on opening weekend it was considered a failure and written off by many here including me. It was still written off as a failure for many weeks after by those that track the weekly box office and give profit/loss summaries. Even now after we know for a fact that its moved into profitability during theatrical some still try to frame it as a failure, for reasons.

Its a snapshot, its not complete, and it really doesn't provide a lot of information even on the profit/loss which its trying to be used as for narrative purposes.

 

[Disney Irish]

If the intent is to account for every single dollar that is ever made for a movie, then it’s inconsistent to only include the marketing costs for the theater run. If revenue is for the life of the movie, then all of the costs have to be also, not half of them. But that seems fine to me.

Or if you don’t want to consider all of the money that comes later (because it hasn’t been earned or reported yet) then sure try to figure out how much of marketing is just for the theater time. That feels largely futile though.* But I think it’s also fine to say here’s where it is now. When more info is obtained, we’ll update. I know you post the reports if/when they’re released. Otherwise it’s all spitballing.

*Either way, I still don’t see a particularly strong case for the theatrical marketing number being 25%. If 50% is likely an underestimate then using 25% for theaters is a severe underestimate.

The problem though is that those that like to use this for framing a narrative never come back and do an addendum to their "summary" of profit/loss. They just flat out state its a failure (or success) with their "math" and wash their hands of it, until the next time they want to bring up said movie to point to as a failure because of "narratives" without again updating it for the post-theatrical numbers.

This is the reason why several of us try to give those updates real time to give a complete picture.

 

[easyrowrdw]

A snapshot is meaningless, even opening weekend, especially when trying to use it to frame a narrative of success or failure and profit/loss, and use it to give a summary of the end of year totals, as several posters do here.

For example lets use a recent example of Mufasa, if you went based it on opening weekend it was considered a failure and written off by many here including me. It was still written off as a failure for many weeks after by those that track the weekly box office and give profit/loss summaries. Even now after we know for a fact that its moved into profitability during theatrical some still try to frame it as a failure, for reasons.

Its a snapshot, its not complete, and it really doesn't provide a lot of information even on the profit/loss which its trying to be used as for narrative purposes.

No, they aren't. They are incomplete, but they are not meaningless. Quarterly reports are snapshots. They're not complete, but they're not meaningless either. I mean, your next post says you give, "updates real time to give a complete picture." But those updates are snapshots too. If snapshots are meaningless then so are your updates. I don't think that and I'm sure you don't either.

 

[Disney Irish]

No, they aren't. They are incomplete, but they are not meaningless. Quarterly reports are snapshots. They're not complete, but they're not meaningless either. I mean, your next post says you give, "updates real time to give a complete picture." But those updates are snapshots too. If snapshots are meaningless then so are your updates. I don't think that and I'm sure you don't either.

Agree to disagree. Because if I base my company's future on a "snapshot" I'll go out of business. So maybe you're using a different definition of snapshot. In this context I'm using it to mean a glance at a moment in time, not the final picture. In business, companies use a "snapshot" to see where they are at that moment in time to see if they need to adjust to meet a specific set of goals, but its not a final look where they find out if they hit said goals or not.

Also quarterlies aren't "snapshots", they are the final numbers for that quarter, ie they don't change.

 

[Tha Realest]

Also quarterlies aren't "snapshots", they are the final numbers for that quarter, ie they don't change.

Unless we’re in Hogwarts, snapshots are exactly that - a fixed picture from a moment in time. The quarterlies reflect the financial picture as of the end of that quarter (e.g., March 29, 2025). It is a snapshot of the financial health of a publicly traded company at the end of that quarter.

 

[easyrowrdw]

Agree to disagree. Because if I base my company's future on a "snapshot" I'll go out of business. So maybe you're using a different definition of snapshot. In this context I'm using it to mean a glance at a moment in time, not the final picture. In business, companies use a "snapshot" to see where they are at that moment in time to see if they need to adjust to meet a specific set of goals, but its not a final look where they find out if they hit said goals or not.

Also quarterlies aren't "snapshots", they are the final numbers for that quarter, ie they don't change.

I think we have different definitions of meaningless. Best of luck in your business endeavors

 

[Disney Irish]

Unless we’re in Hogwarts, snapshots are exactly that - a fixed picture from a moment in time. The quarterlies reflect the financial picture as of the end of that quarter (e.g., March 29, 2025). It is a snapshot of the financial health of a publicly traded company at the end of that quarter.

Well I guess we have different definitions. Because a snapshot is meant to be a check on where things are BEFORE you hit the end of the quarter in order to make sure you'll still hit your targets.

But I don't care what term you all want to use. The box office is not a complete picture, never has been, never will be.

 

[Disney Irish]

I think we have different definitions of meaningless. Best of luck in your business endeavors

We must, and thanks my business endeavors are doing just fine.

Anyways, I think the idea of using just the box office to determine if a movie is a profit or loss for a studio is a fool errand as its not a complete picture. And I think you agree for the most part, even if we disagree on the definitions of some business terms.

 

[Tony the Tigger]

True, matinee shows were cheaper. And then they added discount days, so it used to be just Tuesdays were discount days all day. Now they've added a second day, and I've seen talks about more. This shows they aren't getting the bodies in the theaters they expect, ie they are worried as ticket sales continue to dwindle year-after-year.

Also, ticket prices have gone up considerably, so cutting back on a slow day #1 is just turning back the clock to more reasonable pricing and #2 making the day more profitable by increasing volume. (Selling 5 tickets at $15 = $75. Selling 15 tickets at $7.50 = $112.50 + concessions for 10 more people. This is in no way bad.

A snapshot is meaningless, even opening weekend, especially when trying to use it to frame a narrative of success or failure and profit/loss

I understand what you are saying in the context of this thread. In the larger context, opening weekend numbers have long been tracked, broken records acknowledged, etc. In that context, they are not meaningless. I don’t think you were saying they were, but I think someone is reacting to your phrasing.

The problem though is that those that like to use this for framing a narrative never come back and do an addendum to their "summary" of profit/loss. They just flat out state its a failure (or success) with their "math" and wash their hands of it, until the next time they want to bring up said movie to point to as a failure because of "narratives" without again updating it for the post-theatrical numbers.

This is the reason why several of us try to give those updates real time to give a complete picture.

Yup.

No, they aren't. They are incomplete, but they are not meaningless.

I agree, but I think we should note his qualifier: “…especially when trying to use it to frame a narrative of success or failure and profit/loss.”

In the context of this thread, people have jumped to conclusions based on opening weekend numbers, which did turn out to be meaningless when the film “had legs” and became profitable later in its run than is typical. (Mufasa.)

Anyways, I think the idea of using just the box office to determine if a movie is a profit or loss for a studio is a fool errand as it’s not a complete picture.

Again, yes - if using it to determine P or L overall. But it’s a longstanding metric we’ve tracked and used (and still use) having little to do with the overall profitability discussion. It stands on its own.

And again, even though you are putting qualifiers, I can see how folks may misunderstand to think you’re saying these numbers have no meaning overall.

 

[TP2000]

As I said just run your equation, but don’t use a theatrical marketing budget of 50%, but 25% (for the theatrical window and ignore the other half spent post theatrically) and you’ll get the same result.

Wait, what? We're now saying that the average marketing budget is only 25% of the production budget, instead of the historical estimate of 50%? What happens when Disney itself brags they spent a specific dollar amount, like the $140 Million they spent on The Little Mermaid in 2023? (More than the 50% of the budget, which should have been $125 Million).

Do we just pretend Disney only spends 25% of the production budget on marketing, until they admit they actually spent 60%?

I’ve long heard that marketing costs can be reasonably estimated at half of the budget for major movies. We’re saying it’s now 25%?

Thank God it's not just me.

Yup, the more complicated answer is 50% is the marketing floor, it’s way underestimated. We have absolutely zero validated tool to calculate marketing because it’s so highly elastic to how it does initially. I’ve seen a few case examples where it’s 40% and that’s largely on the rug pulls for very expensive films that fall out of the gate. When movies go big we often see marketing budgets pushing 80… 100%. The floor on Illumination films is usually more like 100%+. They save in production but spend like Disney-esque.

Oh, geez. So 50% of the production budget is the "floor" for the average marketing budget of almost all movies, and on some really big movies (Barbie? Toy Story 6? Avatar 7?) they spend 80% to 100% of the production budget on marketing?

But for the purposes of this thread, we need to pretend that Disney only spends 25% of the production budget on global marketing for their mega-budget tentpole movies from Marvel, Lucas, WDAS, Pixar, etc.?

I do appreciate your willingness to engage on this topic @BrianLo, but I just can't make the equation 50% to 80% = 25% work inside my pea-sized brain. Granted, it's very late and I've been at the Pinot Noir again. But I'm going to stick with the historically established ballpark figure that a major movie studio spends 50% of a movie's production budget on global marketing.

And I'll just accept that 50% is often a lowball figure for the box office breakeven points, and for some of these movies it's even higher than what we're throwing around here.