I have probably been one of the most vocal proponents on this site of this partnership with Cameron ever since it was first announced. I have praised everything from the original concept art all the way up through when the floating mountains first became visible to finally having seen it during AP and DVC previews.
The one thing that I was never certain about was the merchandise side of this venture. Obviously, this is Disney, so obviously there was going to be merchandise. I never gave it much attention as I am not a huge merchandise guy beyond coffee mugs and T-shirts. I really thought that this was the one area where they would struggle. Apparently I was wrong on that account. If I were Disney, I would give whoever the individual or team was that worked on this part of the project promotions or bonuses. I cannot believe how well the merchandise part of this is doing. The fact that they were able to come up with as much as they did was impressive enough, but to actually be stocking out of merchandise items is incredible. When we went - it was 4 adults - 4 T-shirts, a necklace, a phone case and 2 pins were purchased. And this was from a group of people where only 1 of the 4 really liked the movie, one had not even seen it, and one downright did not like the movie at all. And my wife and I have 3 kids and we are returning in July so that the kids can see it now that school is out. I already know that if the banshees are back in stock we will be purchasing 1 or 2 of those, and my daughter wants the face scan Avatar figure. And this is from an IP that has one movie from 2009, that so many people would most likely agree has long since fallen out of the cultural zeitgeist (if it ever really even was in it beyond it raking in the most money ever for a single movie).
Kudos to Disney on this one.
