ebid on 'Toy Story'.

patman99 · 18 October 2013 at 9:59PM

A bit of a coupe for Ebid. Turns-out Disney Pixar must be fans of the #2 auction site. In the new Toy Story film they show the villain selling stolen toys on the site.

There was a 30 minute trailer on ABC a couple of nights back and someone alerted Mark & Gazza (Ebid's owners). They had no idea, so, having researched some details, there is now an Ebid account in the name of the Toy Story villain along with listings of toys (all characters from the film).

If you pop across to Ebid & search for user 'Iguanalover75', you will see what I mean.

If it was a gaff by Disney Pixar & they claim to have not heard of Ebid, then it will be a spectacular own goal for the film makers.

Meanwhile, Ebid will be using this fortuanate piece of luck to cash-in.

I just wonder how much Ebay are kicking themselves for not getting in with a product placement deal.

RFW · 18 October 2013 at 10:31PM

patman99 wrote: »

A bit of a coupe for Ebid. Turns-out Disney Pixar must be fans of the #2 auction site. In the new Toy Story film they show the villain selling stolen toys on the site.

There isn't a new feature film, it's a short tv programme for Halloween. It wasn't a 30 minute trailer, that was the show.
I doubt it will push Ebid where they need to be but can't harm.
Also, are they the number 2 auction site? I've no idea, I just thought there were others that had that claim.

mrcol1000 · 18 October 2013 at 10:54PM

I doubt they intentionally decided to use Ebid. Product Placement is big business in the films and I am sure other auction sites would have been quite happy to pay to have their auction site used in the film. You would have thought someone at Pixar would have taken 5 seconds to put Ebid in Google and see if it existed.

It is a nice story though and good on Ebid for making the most of their surprise fortune.

patman99 · 18 October 2013 at 11:42PM

Sometimes, just sometimes, things get done by committee. I guess that when they were putting together the storyboard for the 'special' a bunch of people were tasked with coming-up with the name of an auction site & without checking, all went 2how about 'Ebid'?" and so the seed was set.

soolin · 19 October 2013 at 10:01AM

http://www.wickedlocal.com/littleton/news/lifestyle/x1467724502/TV-review-Toy-Story-of-Terror-full-of-Pixar-goodness

Are they being 'funny' when they say "the ever-looming threat of being sold on eBid (great comical touch)"

There are currently 703 items listed with the keyword 'Toy Story' on ebid. 505 closed sales of which there are 11 successful sales. That is probably the highest amount of succesful sales I have ever seen on ebid.

I also think it is very sad if they did invent a name for an auction site and no one on a committe or at any stage realised it was real. If I were ebid I would be appalled at that rather than celebrate the fact that the name was used because no one had ever heard ot if before.

RFW · 19 October 2013 at 11:06AM

soolin wrote: »

There are currently 703 items listed with the keyword 'Toy Story' on ebid. 505 closed sales of which there are 11 successful sales. That is probably the highest amount of successful sales I have ever seen on ebid.

41,000 on Ebay and just short of 67,000 completed listings.
They could try the promotion "Ebid as invented by Pixar in 2013" and forget the previous 15 year trading.
I've not watched the show yet (it's on Sky later this month) but can't see anyone who hasn't heard of Ebid thinking it's just a joke name they've made up that sounds like "Ebay". That is also one of Ebid's ongoing problems their name makes them sound like a cheap Ebay copy.

soolin · 19 October 2013 at 11:28AM

RFW wrote: »

41,000 on Ebay and just short of 67,000 completed listings.
They could try the promotion "Ebid as invented by Pixar in 2013" and forget the previous 15 year trading.
I've not watched the show yet (it's on Sky later this month) but can't see anyone who hasn't heard of Ebid thinking it's just a joke name they've made up that sounds like "Ebay". That is also one of Ebid's ongoing problems their name makes them sound like a cheap Ebay copy.

I think Ebid need to be careful how they trade on this unexpected advertising. Even the Ebid forums have people suggesting it could be slightly negative if they used a real auction site for a scenario with a thief...knowing Ebid wouldn't sue them. I can see the possibility in a meeting where they want to use an auction site and think of eBay only to have the lawyers throw up their hands in horror on the basis that eBay would sue but Ebid wouldn't bother.

justapoorboy · 19 October 2013 at 12:18PM

I doubt it will push Ebid where they need to be but can't harm.

Yup - agreed. All publicity is good publicity. Even just a mention = "Name Recognition" which many companies pay big $ for.

Committee ? You have a strange idea of how big business operates. The only committee big businesses have is their Remuneration Committee.

Sadly I agree that Ebid does sound like a cheap Ebay copy or even just a generic (general) name for an online auction site.

Product Placement is big business

True but maybe Ebay decided not to pay up. They don't need to and no other auction site has the dosh.

Ebay gets $Millions in free advertising purely because its the only online auction site that most people have heard of. You even hear it on the Beeb !!

If they had used Ebay nobody would be talking about this. We are talking about it because they used EBid.

sequence · 19 October 2013 at 12:42PM

Maybe ebay paid to have ebid put in there, so that everyone thinks the thieves only sell on ebid, not on ebay ?

soolin · 19 October 2013 at 12:55PM

sequence wrote: »

Maybe ebay paid to have ebid put in there, so that everyone thinks the thieves only sell on ebid, not on ebay ?

Tsk tsk

looking at the ebid forums a newbie signed up just to post details of the 'sighting' with suggestions about how it could be used for publicity. The owner of ebid logged in to ackowledge the sighting and has acted on the proposals to run with some on site advertising by setting up a user name the same as the one that features in the short story. They are also running a charity auction and are hoping this will go viral on facebook- they also hope this thread will promote them in Google as well.

For anyone interested in ebid we do have a thread here :

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.php?t=483786&page=35

patman99 · 19 October 2013 at 2:49PM

Soolin, Ebid have taken the bull by the horns with this one. There is a chance it will go viral as more people talk about it and share it.

Ebid's owner had no idea about the mention until a US-based seller mentioned it. It snowballed from there on in. Mark & Gazza could have contacted Disney Pixar and threatened them with legal action for not only using the name of the site, but for inferring that it is home to thieves.
Instead, they decided there could be a bigger potential financial gain by cashing in on the unexpected advertising.

Disney will know that they cannot sue Ebid for doing what they are doing as Ebid would have a bigger more successful counter-claim.

It has been noted that ebay's share price has dropped 5% over the last month, as have the number of listings.

ebid on 'Toy Story'.

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