2006 SE WI PBS Serenity Promotion Recap a.k.a. Browncoats Help Raise $1,114 for PBS by suinegagpf

GENERAL DISCUSSIONS

2006 SE WI PBS Serenity Promotion Recap a.k.a. Browncoats Help Raise $1,114 for PBS

POSTED BY: SUINEGAGPF
UPDATED: Saturday, May 13, 2006 10:13
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Tuesday, May 9, 2006 6:49 PM

Howdy All,

First, I want to thank all those who graciously donated money to help promote Firefly/Serenity via the 2006 Channel 10 Great TV Auction here in South East Wisconsin. Without your assistance, this effort could not have been as far reaching.

I'm happy to report that with your assistance, 18 promo spots across a 6 day auction period were secured for Firefly and Serenity. With these 18 spots, the Firefly/Serenity items raised approximately $1,114 for the PBS station here in Southeast Wisconsin.

- - - THE BOOKS

Monetary Donations Received via Paypal Link: 10 Donations Total from fellow Browncoats
Sum Total: $243.00 and 1 Serenity RPG Book

To simplify the math, I used the donated money for the sole purchase of Serenity DVDs. All other items were donated by myself.

Items Purchased with Donated Money:
4 Serenity DVDs (@ $14.11 each from deapdiscountdvds.com)
10 Serenity DVDs (@ $19.99 each from Best Buy)
Totaling: $256.34

Besides making up the $13.34 difference, I also donated:
18 Firefly DVD Sets
4 Serenity DVDs
1 Serenity RPG Book
2 Serenity - Those Left Behind Books
4 Firefly Soundtrack CDs

- - - COOL PICS

Picture of the donated money converted to Serenity DVDs and the donated Serenity RPG:

Picture of all but the last 4 Serenity DVDs purchased:

Screen Captures of all 18 donated items and their selling prices:

Note: The quality of the screen caps has more to do with my TV reception, recording technology, and screen capture equipment. The items looked a lot better on live TV than they do here.

- - - PURCHASING SUM-UP

Originally, I had purchased 14 Firefly DVD sets to donate to the PBS auction. I hoped to raise at least enough money to purchase 14 Serenity DVDs to complement the Firefly DVD Sets.

In the course of researching Serenity DVD pricing I stumbled upon deepdiscountdvd.com selling the DVD for $14.11. I put in a small order (Qty. 4) with them to see if they were legit. They delivered my small order in a timely manner so I decided to order through them.

Since I could afford 17.2 Serenity DVDs at that price from the donated money, I went ahead and ordered another 4 Firefly DVDs along with few other miscellaneous Firefly/Serenity items to sweeten a few of the donations to PBS. Unfortunately, when I went to purchase the remainging 13.2 (actually 14) Serenity DVDs, deepdiscountdvd.com was showing a ship date of May 23rd, 2006 so I had to cancel the order. I tried to order 10 Serenity DVDs through Amazon.com. However, there is apparently an online shortage of Serenity DVDs as Amazon.com is limiting orders of Serenity DVDs to maximum order quantity of five.

So, I defaulted to picking up the Serenity DVDs at a couple of local Best Buys.

- - - THE AUCTION SUM-UP

The promotion received for each donation was in line with what was expected. The copy writer did a lot better this year with the descriptions. This may in part be due to the fact that I noted directly to the copy writer on the donation forms how the items included in each package related to one another. (i.e. Serenity is the movie follow on to the Firefly TV Series, etc).

There were 5 different Firefly/Serenity package configurations donated:
A) Firefly DVD Set, Serenity DVD (MSRP Value: $80)
B) Firefly DVD Set, Serenity DVD, Serenity - TLB Book (MSRP Value: $90)
C) Firefly DVD Set, Serenity DVD, Firefly Soundtrack CD (MSRP Value: $98)
D) Firefly DVD Set, Serenity DVD, Serenity OVC Book (MSRP Value: $100)
E) Firefly DVD Set, Serenity DVD, Serenity RPG Book (MSRP Value: $120)

From my records:
.Aired 2006 MAY 1 (Monday)
..Item M-2537 - ~01:58 PM - Type A - Sold: $42?
..Item M-2533 - ~06:12 PM - Type C - Sold: $63
..Item M-2528 - ~08:22 PM - Type D - Sold: $76
.Aired 2006 MAY 2 (Tuesday)
..Item M-2541 - ~01:35 PM - Type A - Sold: $46
..Item M-2531 - ~05:25 PM - Type C - Sold: $60
..Item M-2534 - ~11:30 PM - Type B - Sold: $47
.Aired 2006 MAY 3 (Wednesday)
..Item M-2539 - ~01:49 PM - Type A - Sold: $42
..Item M-2536 - ~02:44 PM - Type A - Sold: $45
..Item M-2532 - ~03:38 PM - Type C - Sold: $73
..Item M-2526 - ~10:30 PM - Type E - Sold: $45
.Aired 2006 MAY 4 (Thursday)
..Item M-2527 - ~04:42 PM - Type E - Sold: $50
..Item M-2542 - ~08:00 PM - Type A - Sold: $76
.Aired 2006 MAY 5 (Friday)
..Item M-2538 - ~04:13 PM - Type A - Sold: $75
..Item M-2529 - ~06:40 PM - Type D - Sold: $69
..Item M-2540 - ~11:30 PM - Type A - Sold: $85 (Overbid)
.Aired 2006 MAY 6 (Saturday)
..Item M-2535 - ~01:51 PM - Type B - Sold: $100 (Overbid)
..Item M-2543 - ~04:03 PM - Type A - Sold: $55
..Item M-2530 - ~07:53 PM - Type C - Sold: $65

Total money raised for SE WI PBS Station: $1,114.00

- - - THE CREDIT

Ultimately, I decided that all of the items should be donated on behalf of: Friends of FireflyFans.net. I did this because:
1) The look of confusion that crossed the face of the auction volunteer as I tried to explain that I was thinking about donating the items on behalf of two different organizations but that the forms would reflect the same contact info.
2) FireflyFans.net is a good gateway site into the fandom (IMO).
3) The name of the site directly ties into the items donated, the fandom, and what we're about.
4) We seriously need to grow our numbers (IMO) if we plan on taking over the world (or at least converting as many people as we can).

- - - THE FUTURE

I am of course planning on doing something similar next year.

In the meantime, I would invite you all to check out the following link:
http://www.pbs.org/aboutpbs/aboutpbs_support_auctions.html

Listed are all of the PBS stations that use auctions as a means to raise funds. Perhaps there is a on-air auction in your neck of the woods that you could help organize Firefly/Serenity promotional spots for.

Thanks again,
-suinegagpf (Dave)

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Tuesday, May 9, 2006 8:57 PM