Adverts for NCS toys?

by **shaqui** » Sat Oct 22, 2005 12:42 pm

Are there any?

I'm struck by the campaigns for other TV & film related toys (Batman Begins at the mo, plus Barbie etc) but nothing to promote the NCS toys or DVDs. Shouldn't someone be bringing their attention to the public eye or something?

:evil:

by **Kinggodzillak** » Sat Oct 22, 2005 3:06 pm

I guess if there were any, they'd be being shown during the episodes.

Actually, no. That makes sense, and ITV doesn't do making sense when it comes to NCS...

by **shaqui** » Sat Oct 22, 2005 3:23 pm

Kinggodzillak wrote:That makes sense, and ITV doesn't do making sense when it comes to NCS...

Well, no actually. it would be down to the toy manufacturers to pay to make a commercial, and then pay for a TV slot at the appropriate time.

I wonder if these people are expecting the new series to sell on the back of 'the Anderson genre' - but the new series is somewhat removed from the original puppet shows, and I'd have expected some pro-active publicity for merchandise so people know the difference...

by **Chris C** » Sat Oct 22, 2005 9:04 pm

My son told me about 4 weeks ago that he saw an advert on telly for some of the Captain Scarlet toys, on CiTV before M0M started. He hasn't seen it since though.

by **Kinggodzillak** » Sat Oct 22, 2005 9:17 pm

Oh, MOM had the Scarlet toys as a competition prize during Virus, didn't they? Guess that's a little bit of advertising...

by **Chris C** » Sat Oct 22, 2005 11:56 pm

The whole merchandise/publicity thing is totally ridiculous. Out in town today we could see the shops are full of Batman, Wallace and Grommit, Barbie, Star Wars, Dr Who etc books, DVD's and toys. Try and find anything to do with NCS is damn near impossible. There are Thunderbirds books and toys, Lavender Castle, Stingray and OCS DVD's, no need to hunt for them. We dug out just one copy of the NCS DVD (no box sets to be seen). No mention of it in the shops listings of top 100 DVD's, apart from Woolies.

There are piles of annuals out too, I know the Captain Scarlet one was 'postponed', but really the books and annual should have been out now while people are starting to look for Christmas presents and the series is still being shown.

My other half is resorting to making up our own NCS calendar!!

by **DanDud88** » Sun Oct 23, 2005 10:49 am

I just saw an advert for NCS Skybase. It was shown after toonatic on ITV 1
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by **Chris C** » Sun Oct 23, 2005 12:34 pm

I was quizzing my son to see if the ad he saw was an ad for the competition in MoM, but he says it wasn't, and that he saw it when Toonatic was on on the Saturday. Maybe that is the timeslot Bandai have chosen.

Website · by **Sage** » Sun Oct 23, 2005 5:47 pm

There was little article type thing about them in SFX magazine last month.
Otherwise no idea, but then I tend to blank out adverts.

by **Chris C** » Sun Nov 20, 2005 12:59 pm

Channel 5 have just shown a good ad for the toys. I only caught the tail end but nice to know the campaign is still on and has spread further than ITV!

by **Jay** » Sun Nov 20, 2005 2:07 pm

Argos have had the toys in their winter catalogue since it came out in July!

by **Kambei** » Sun Nov 20, 2005 10:46 pm

The problem is that after the furore over the He-Man cartoon and toy ads back in the 80's, TV companies are not supposed to show adverts for toys in the same time slots as the cartoon or programme. Also, I found out quite recently that the probable reason for the late showing of the action figures is that with British television and advertising rules, if a toyline already exists, they cannot show a cartoon based around that toy. That is why the Action Man cartoon has been seen in Europe and America, but not in the UK. If the action figures had come out first, we would not have seen the cartoon, except on video/DVD.

by **Chris C** » Mon Nov 21, 2005 11:56 pm

Well I'd say it's a good thing showing the ads on Channel 5, there could be an audience who might not know NCS was being shown on ITV. Shame it wasn't a few months' earlier though!

by **Kambei** » Tue Nov 22, 2005 5:28 pm

Chris C wrote:Well I'd say it's a good thing showing the ads on Channel 5, there could be an audience who might not know NCS was being shown on ITV. Shame it wasn't a few months' earlier though!

This is what I have been saying since about May. The advertising and merchandising has been grossly mishandled. I would go as far as to say incompetently, IMO. Surely Sony and Granada have the financial clout to do advertising.

When I emailed the official website, I got a reply stating that I would be surprised and delighted with what was coming out. That was in June/July and all I have seen so far are the action figures and comic. Okay, I like them, but a cancelled annual is the icing on the cake. Have these people never heard of contracts? Who on this forum actually believes that we are going to see an annual next year?
As for the books and whatnot coming out in February. All I can say is:

Too little, too late. There will be something else to have taken kidsd' goldfish attention spans by then.

Whoever worked on the advertising and merchandise campaign obviously is very new to the industry and has not done their resaerch:
Transdformers: massive advertising campaign and cartoon in primetime children's television
He-Man: Bloody enormous advertising campaign shoved down peoples throats (which ironically led to a change in advertising rules) and primetime cartoon slot. Gobsmackingly successful.
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Same as He-Man. Pysychologically brilliant campaign with linked cartoon that led to parents literally fighting each other for figures in the toy aisles when the shops could not keep up demand.
Thunderbirds: Okay, even those of us who frequent the toy/comic stores were a little surprised by this one. But again, great promtional advertising led to toys selling out in the shops. Tracey Island playset was the most sought after Blue Peter instruction sheet of all time.
Teletubbies: Gimmee a shotgun :twisted:

But fair's fair, brilliant advertising.
Toy Story: Buzz Lightyear *flew* out of the shops.
Doctor Who: Ye Gods! Even UK Gold have mouted a massive advertising campaign for their repeat showings. No-one could miss those gorgeous Dalek posters draped down telephone box doors? I want one!
And we come to:
New Captain Scarlet: Advertising mostly done by fans via word of mouth. Two month wait for figures (nicely sculpted), five month wait for comic, although it is nicely put together. Sod all advertising, b****r all in the way of promotional material, books only coming out months after initial run. Website might as well not exist, no updates since July? And product recognition is virtually zero. I went into three different Sc-Fi shops the week after the figures came out and the reaction was: When did they come out?!? I wanted to stock them, but couldn't find out anything about them. To date, I have seen the figures in Toys R Us and Toymaster.

Sorry if this has been a bit of a rant, but I really did want to see the CGI Scarlet succeed. This lack of back-up has done nothing but harm it. I wanted to see it do well because I have enjoyed what I have seen so far, and would love to see at least another couple of seasons. Technically, it has been superb, with astonishing CGI effects. Kudos to everybody involved. All of you deserve better than the treatment it has been given. Also I was hoping that a success might have meant new series of UFO, Stingray, Space 1999 and even Space Precinct.