Movie screen seen as best way to reach teen demographic

This back-to-school season, retailers are betting on the big screen as the best way to reach teen consumers. Companies such as JCPenney, Build-A-Bear and American Girl have all partnered with cinema advertising company Screen Vision to launch their campaigns.

JCPenney’s cinema advertising campaign launched nationally July 13 and will run through August 23.

“We took a step back and realized that many teens were watchingbig block buster movies during the summer months, and so it would be the perfect place to reach them with our back-to-school campaign,” said Todd Beurman, national director of JCPenney’s advertising. “We wanted to have other ways of reaching them other than the traditional television and print markets.”

JCPenney will be promoting primarily apparel items, including its latest denim line by denim designers Chip & Pepper called CP7, through two 60-second movie theater spots. The ads will be accompanied by handouts given out in the theaters.

Based on the latest statistics, there’s a good chance JCPenney’s first movie theater marketing attempt could be quite successful in reaching teenagers. According to the 2007 Arbitron Cinema Advertising study, advertising in movie theaters reaches more than 124 million, or 45%, of Americans ages 12 or older in a month. In addition, 81% of teens and 67% of young adults ages 18 to 24 have been to the movies in the past 30 days.

“American Eagle [is] positioned to take [the] share for BTS,” said Todd Slater, a senior retail analyst for Lazard Capital Markets, in a report. “The key merchandising takeaways…are an assortment featuring more ‘wear now’ products…more feminine looks, and a robust denim offering that is marketed more intelligently. For instance, this year’s denim includes more premium rinses and darker tones, and the marketing campaign (a “fit challenge” featuring a $10 August/September bounce back) should drive incremental sales and higher conversion rates relative to last year’s promotion.”