“Paw Patrol” rampage: Behind ViacomCBS’s plan to face Disney

August 20 (Reuters) – When “Paw Patrol: The Movie” hits theaters and on the Paramount + streaming service on Friday, it will launch one of ViacomCBS’s most ambitious efforts to take on Disney in the streaming war.

The release of the feature film based on the animated children’s series about a group of rescue dogs who protect their community will be supported by an “eight-figure” marketing blitz, with 1,800 TV commercials on channels like Nickelodeon. It involves partnerships with nearly 200 companies – from Kellogg’s cereal to Best Western hotels – on links for toys and other products, many of which will come with a free trial of Paramount +.

The Strategy is the most publicized example of a game plan developed by ViacomCBS to grow its children’s franchises – including “SpongeBob,” “iCarly” and “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles” – and use their success to become a competitor. credible. in the war to pay streaming subscribers at a time when industry consolidation is putting the company at a disadvantage.

“Disney is the gold standard in terms of building and monetizing franchises,” said Tuna Amobi, CFRA analyst.

“ViacomCBS is looking to do the same, but they haven’t been as aggressive in terms of starting early and pivoting to streaming and taking some of the potentially groundbreaking actions we’ve seen from other companies, especially with the how COVID has affected the industry. So the movie ‘Paw Patrol’ could be a litmus test in terms of streaming and theatrical release.

Friday will mark the first time ViacomCBS will release a film in theaters and on Paramount + simultaneously, a move the company announced in June. Executives said he assessed the likelihood of parents bringing their unvaccinated children to the movies amid growing cases of the COVID-19 Delta variant.

In the short term, ViacomCBS’s family films will likely debut in theaters and on Paramount + on the same date, via a very short theatrical window followed by a Paramount + release, or skip a theatrical release altogether, Brian said. Robbins, president of Nickelodeon, the ViacomCBS children’s channel where “Paw Patrol” debuted as a television series in 2013.

The movie “Paw Patrol,” the TV show’s first spin-off, is among the most related products and global retailers of all films distributed by the company, said Pam Kaufman, president of ViacomCBS Consumer Products.

It is also the first time that ViacomCBS has used the full strength of its properties and partnerships to attract people to Paramount +, the streaming service it designed from the merger of CBS and Viacom. Many products related to consumer products include a free one-month subscription to the service, which costs $ 5 per month with ads and $ 10 per month without ads.

The marketing campaign around the film “is not only at the service of Paramount +,” Robbins said. “It’s in the service of the ‘Paw Patrol’ franchise which, in turn, as this franchise grows, should make our streaming service.”

New franchise content is crucial to the growth of Paramount + subscribers, executives say, as it helps attract new subscribers, who then stay on the service so their children can watch older franchise content, such as six seasons of “Paw Patrol” currently available on the streaming service.

ViacomCBS is also betting on its “Star Trek” franchise, among others, presenting its very first “Star Trek” animated series for families – “Star Trek: Prodigy” – later this year on Paramount +, followed by a second window. viewing on Nickelodeon.

Yet for “Paw Patrol: The Movie”, success in sales of consumer products, box office tickets and new streaming subscribers is far from guaranteed. Families may prefer to stay at home rather than going to the movies or shopping at physical stores that promote the movie in their aisles. A preschool movie has a limited audience compared to the multigenerational offerings of Marvel and others.

And in streaming, ViacomCBS is among the smallest of its peers, with 42 million streaming subscribers compared to 174 million for Disney. Even as ViacomCBS seeks organic growth, Non-Executive Chairman Shari Redstone has sought partners as Discovery and Amazon strengthen each other through their acquisitions of AT&T and MGM’s WarnerMedia assets, respectively.

On Wednesday, ViacomCBS and Comcast announced a joint streaming service, SkyShowtime, which will launch in smaller European markets next year. Read more

“You want to create a virtuous circle of content creation and monetization, and I wouldn’t say ViacomCBS is still the gold standard for doing it, and that’s probably one of the strategic justifications for the CBS-Viacom merger. : create more scale and create more franchises, ”said Amobi.

Reporting by Helen Coster in New York Editing by Kenneth Li and Nick Zieminski

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