Arrow Turns “Deep Throat” and Other Titles into a Merchandising Empire
Wednesday, March 25th, 2009 | From XBIZ.com
Deep Throat Corvette
From XBIZ Special March 2009 Marketing Issue
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BRANDING X: A NEW WAY TO MAINSTREAM ADULT
Arrow Turns “Deep Throat” and Other Titles into a Merchandising Empire
By Michael McClay
Arrow Productions, widely considered the oldest established American adult video company is not only porndom’s original trailblazer with numerous classics in its catalog, including “Deep Throat,” the Las Vegas-based company also has the distinction of being a leading pioneer in the area of special marketing. In recent times Arrow further expanded its impact into the merchandising and branding arena, licensing its titles for products other than the distribution and sales of sex videos.
Arrow has made a significant impact in the energy beverage marketplace with the release of the Deep Throat Energy Drink in May 2007. Then a year later Arrow made its second big marketing splash with the publication in the first of a series of comic books with “Debbie Does Dallas” followed by three other titles: “Candy Stripers,” “The Devil in Miss Jones” and “Tell Them Johnny Wadd is Here.” Finally, licensing theatrical posters for “Deep Throat,” “Debbie Does Dallas,” “Candy Stripers” and “The Goddaughter” completed a third major merchandising coup in a process that the company considers the wave of the future. Plans for other items include coffee, film cell wall art, costumes, T-shirts, hats, hoodies, belts, stickers, clocks, watches, beach towels, shot cups, beer mugs and other products.
The long and colorful history of Arrow Productions itself is the stuff of legends and the company’s Marketing Director Robert Interlandi who carries the banner as a second generation member of the organization has created quite an impact with his aggressive, edgy style.
“Even though our entire industry markets product considered controversial and cutting edge to mainstream, the adult industry’s marketing approach is surprisingly stale and static by today’s Madison Avenue standards,” says Interlandi. “Just look at the way mainstream companies market products on cable and the internet. Some of it really pushes the mainstream envelope.”
About four years ago after watching how adult marketed it product to consumers, he presented a marketing/licensing idea to Arrow owner Ray Pistol. Interlandi felt that some kind of consumer product tie-in to their video catalog could make a noteworthy impact. “I thought of what George Lucas did with ‘Star Wars’ merchandising and we thought we could do the same thing licensing with adult, since we had all the classic icons of adult,” says Interlandi. “I felt strongly that it could put us more in the mainstream.”
Several ideas were discussed, especially a beer. But a beer carried certain Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco & Firearms requirements and the added tie-in to adult entertainment would bring too much Federal scrutiny, especially under the conservative Bush administration. “We’ve got nothing to hide, but we felt it was not a good mix at the time – so to speak,” says Interlandi, tongue in cheek.
Then one day while “hoisting a few” at a local pub with other Arrow staffers, they joked about the beer idea and was asked what the slogan would be: “Never too much head” and “put it in a bottle with an extra long neck.” But as he looked around the room, he saw all the non-alcoholic beverages being used a chasers and imagined a can of a “Deep Throat” beverage between the salt and pepper shakers. “The practical side of me also realized that if the drink were non-alcoholic, we could sell it to a wider base – not just those twenty-one and older, but everybody – especially the younger consumers who might think it cool to drink something associated with X,” he says. The booming energy beverage market seemed a natural.
It put Interlandi on quite a mission and fortunately as a Las Vegas resident many licensing trade shows land there sooner or later. “Just by walking at some shows I learned a lot and I picked up some non-beverage licensees as well. A lot of this is footwork – talking to people, networking…asking what they’re doing. It helped to go out of our little porn bubble. I rubbed shoulders with licensors such as Dick Clark, Jimi Hendrix, Elvis and other showbiz icons.”
“Into the Drink”
After a year of lab testing and product research, the Deep Throat Energy Drink debuted at the Adult Expo in 2007 replete with a yellow Corvette emblazoned with the drink’s logo and a mechanical riding bull for brave onlookers.
Arrow Productions launched the Deep Throat Energy drink later in the year and since its launch and an aggressive marketing campaign it has broken into new energy drink marketing and sales avenues. It has been exhibited at over 20 trade shows in the last year and in a number of unique markets including the Fort Worth’s Main St. Festival, South Dakota’s Sturgis Bike Week and many other events/markets unexplored by other energy drink manufacturers. In order to maximize its usage, it is being touted not only as an energy booster, but an alcoholic beverage mixer.
The reviews have been uniformly good, one describing it as having “a slightly berry taste and trending a tad sweeter than your ordinary energy drink, with taste tests concluding that over 90% of the samplers preferred the Deep Throat Energy Drink to its leading competitors.” The drink’s website claims that “the packaging, a tall thin canary yellow can with a retro “Deep Throat” movie poster has proven to be such a hit that people have fished empties out of the trash and took them home as souvenirs.”
Today Arrow’s name and flagship title “Deep Throat” stands out as a perfect example of storybook licensing done right. The Deep Throat Energy Drink, its characteristic yellow and fiery red color theme with the image of Linda Lovelace wrapped around the can with arms spread wide as if to embrace the thirsty consumer looking for an energy fix (and a little titillation) from America’s first official porn queen.
Branding Arrow video releases using an energy drink was a marketing masterstroke and not only are ancillary products in adult entertainment a long time coming, it’s appropriate that the first and most influential adult film ever produced is the flagship article of trade.
According to Arrow and the market, Deep Throat Energy Drink is here to stay; it was as an official nominee for the XBIZ Best Marketing Campaign, it was also nominated for the Best Overall Marketing Campaign at the Las Vegas Adult Expo. Outside the business, the Deep Throat Energy Drink was also nominated for two BevNet.com awards, including Best Energy Drink & Best Overall Marketing Campaign of 2008 and featured in their printed publication, New Beverage Guide.
“This really makes my year,” says Interlandi. “We have worked so hard on the drink. There were days where I would be in a reality TV show starting a 9am and then I do a bar promotion with the mechanical bull until 2 a.m. ending up working 18 hours a day. I also can’t believe that we are the first energy drink to be nominated to an AVN and XBIZ award. With the BevNet award nomination it says that the drink is recognized in the mainstream beverage industry also. I feel like Wayne Gretzky scoring a marketing hat trick.”
“Stand-Up Comics”
One of Interlandi’s original ideas in addition to a beverage was a comic book license. For over four years he pursued it, approaching every nearly every large and small publisher. There were many offers, but too many just didn’t seem to fit right. “They had very stale ideas with no unique approach. When you go after licensees, you want to go after quality. I finally saw eye to eye with Terminal Press and I’m glad I went with them.”
After three years in development and production, Terminal Press launched the series in January at the 2008 Adult Entertainment Expo with a post-apocalyptic adaptation of “Debbie Does Dallas” that debuted and unveiled “Deep Throat,” “Candy Stripers,” “The Devil in Miss Jones” and “Tell Them Johnny Wadd is Here” four months later at Comic-Con in San Diego as part of its ‘HARD/CORE’ line.
Ironically, that “hardcore” moniker is a misnomer, since the entire series actually has no hardcore images, but rather a softcore treatment for the ‘mature reader,’ placing the characters and concepts from the original films in new scenarios including thriller, horror, fairy tale and crime genres designed for contemporary sophisticated audiences.
“Poster Time”
Since the Millennium’s turn, posters have had a renaissance, especially motion picture theatrical one-sheets. Although no adult motion picture has been in theatrical release since the mid-eighties, many of the vintage titles in release by Arrow were once released in movie houses during porn’s so-called “Golden Age” of the ‘70s and ‘80s.
Arrow Productions library includes the aforementioned classics and many are now available online as newly-minted posters, including Gerard Damiano’s original “Deep Throat,” “Debbie Does Dallas,” “Candy Stripers” and “The Goddaughter.”
Arrow has a licensing deal with Vegas-based Acument Entertainment not only to create one-sheets, but canvas poster art, 3D posters and film cell wall art based on Arrow’s classic titles. “I was on a quest for a movie poster license for the past two years,” says Interlandi. “Everyone at Arrow is excited to team up with a company like Acument.
“Arrow’s the type of company that’s thinking like a main stream production company to promote its products and we’re proud to team up with an iconic company like Arrow Productions. The retro porn style is a hot seller and Arrow has tons of great art.” Arrow’s movie posters are available online at www.moviegoods.com.
Arrow Productions & “Deep Throat” History
Originally formed in 1969 under the name Vanguard productions, and later renamed Arrow Productions, the company made blockbuster hits such as “Deep Throat,” “Devil In Miss Jones” and “Debbie Does Dallas.” Over the years Arrow Productions has acquired the distribution rights to many production lines including well known titles like “Alice In Wonderland,” “Tell Them Johnny Wadd is Here,” “Candy Stripers” and “Taxi Girls.”
But Arrow’s reputation as a video manufacturer and distributor was built upon the fact that they were the original distributors of the single most important and influential sex video ever produced: “Deep Throat.”
The Gerard Damiano sex farce with the silly premise and goofy execution unintentionally set the stage for what would become ground zero for the foundation of the entire modern triple-X adult motion picture business. It led to the genre’s general acceptance in urban America and the birth of “Porn Chic” and subsequent acceptance as a true American pop culture milestone. “Deep Throat” had more impact, influence and visibility than any adult film had before or since. As a theatrical release and at the $600 million boxoffice range, “Throat” actually grossed as much as mainstream 1970 mega-blockbusters like “Star Wars,” “Rocky,” “Close Encounters of the Third Kind,” “The Sting,” among others.
The road to merchandising heaven was not easy and the resistance they experienced was even tougher than they realized. “Marketing and licensing X is very difficult and took a long time to be taken seriously,” says Interlandi. “But I think now that after all my struggles people are finally giving us respect. They used to laugh and shun me and now it’s changing. The success and the hard work are finally paying off.
“Someone recently told me that twenty years from now they’ll be calling me a pioneer and I should ‘get ready for it and get used to it.’
“That just gave me the chills. Crazy.”
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