How Disney Sold Sequel To $386M+ Global Opening

When it came to opening a sequel to a classic animated movie, Disney didn’t rest on their laurels in selling Moana 2.

Already, the original 2016 2x Oscar nominated movie has a built-in faithful; the pic being one of the most viewed Disney movies on Disney+. Expanding the brand to a worldwide audience, the Burbank, CA lot executed a multi-prong, bespoke D-Day global marketing campaign, one whose stunts arguably rivaled that of Universal’s blitzkrieg for Wicked. While that Broadway musical adaptation had LEGOs, Mattel dolls and pricey consumer fashion attire, Moana 2 roared with a drone show over the Thames river, projection mapping on the cliffs of Capri, Italy, an immersive 3D LED Tunnel 360° “Gallery” in Florence, Italy; a big digital splash around Korean’s Shinsegae department store, as well as beach-themed takeovers.

There was also a $100M worldwide promotional partner campaign, curated by Lylle Breier, Disney EVP of Partnerships, Promotions, Synergy & Events and her team, that brand list including a Moana 2 Hawaiian airlines wrap-around plane, Ono Hawaiian BBQ, California Pizza Kitchen, Verizon, Oral B, a custom mission with in-game patch notifications for Minecraft, Better Sour gummies, Enterprise Rent-A-Car, 100 Coconuts water, EVA NYC hair care products, jet ski and boat rental agency GetMyBoat, among many others.

Lest we forget about half billion-plus strong social media powerhouse Dwayne Johnson. His appearances included, but weren’t limited to, kicking off Moana 2‘s campaign at April’s CinemaCon in Las Vegas with the pic’s first footage unveiled. This followed by a big stage appearance at Disney’s D23 fan confab in Anaheim in August along with Moana herself, Auli’i Cravalho, not to mention a hysterical ESPN spot with former NFL player Troy Polamalu; the latter joking about how he looks demigod Maui.

iSpot weighed the TV spot U.S. spend for Moana 2 at $20.5M, compared to Paramount shelling out $34M for Gladiator II and Universal’s near $26M expense on Wicked. The global P&A spend per sources was around $120M.

It’s a marketing push that not only yielded a record 5-day domestic opening of $221M, particularly over a Thanksgiving holiday, but one of the top openings worldwide for an animated movie with $386M+.

Other fruits from Disney which cannot be ignored is how Moana 2 pulled in a very diverse audience in the U.S. and Canada with 36% Hispanic and Latino moviegoers leading, followed by 27% Black as well as 11% Asian American.

Asad Ayaz, Disney’s Chief Brand Officer and President of Marketing tells us, “The central idea of the marketing campaign is the return of Moana, Maui and their crew: ‘We’re back’ much like the very first song in the movie. Moana is back along with a cast of beloved characters.” Ayaz orchestrated the sequel’s campaign along with Disney EVP of Marketing, Martha Morrison, and EVP Creative Marketing, Jackson George.

Indeed, the studio is back. Disney, which had once dominated the holiday stretch pre-pandemic with animated movies such as Moana, Coco, Ralph Breaks the Internet and the Frozen franchise seemed to have lost its way with bombs such as last year’s Wish and Strange World. That is until CEO Bob Iger announced back in February during an earnings call that they were flipping the Moana Disney+ series into feature animated sequel. It was all part of Disney Entertainment Co-Chairman Alan Bergman’s plan to double-down on popular IP in the library, while restoring the studio’s reputation for high quality family entertainment after the string of fluff pumped out aggressively for its streaming service during former CEO Bob Chapek’s tenure.

The Disney marketing for Moana 2 leveraged notable media milestones during the course of the year to introduce the expanded worlds of Moana and Maui, read moments such as the Olympic Trials and the Paris Summer Olympics as well as fall TV premieres. The intent of each reveal and activation was to signal Moana 2 as a cultural moviegoing moment for 2024, while also sending the message about the heighten stakes and visual animation scale for the sequel.

Marketing intelligence dictates that studios when advertising a feature musical, should hide such aspects in their trailers. The notion is that feature musicals are a turn-off for most moviegoers. However if you ‘trick’ them, and they thus love the musical once they’re in, business is golden. However, Disney didn’t shy from selling Moana 2 as a musical. Disney found campaign beats to introduce five new songs by The Unofficial Bridgerton Musical songsmiths Emily Bear and Abigail Barlow. The sequel’s first ditty, “We’re Back” was first introduced to exhibitors at CinemaCon back in April. That song along with “Beyond” also played in early spots and trailers with digital spot drops on DisneyMusicVevo in late September and early October. “We’re Back” was even featured as a song for a Moana-themed performance on Dancing With The Stars‘ Disney Night. Bear and Barlow also performed the songs in a small Hollywood club date before the pic opened to social media influencers and press. The duo also took over Instagram with an original editorial piece and the movie’s songs on the flagship @Instagram account which reached 676M-plus followers.

Trailer viewership always says it all when it comes to big box office dollars. The teaser trailer for Moana 2 dropped on May 29 across Disney, Walt Disney Animation and Disney Princess social handles, racking up 178M views in its first 24 hours, and becoming the most-viewed trailer of all-tie for a Disney animated movie. On Aug. 9, the second trailer launched out of D23 garnering over 126M views in its first 24 hours, making it the most-viewed trailer to debut out of D23 and surpassed the second trailer for Inside Out 2. 

Taking advantage of the Olympics, Moana 2 had a custom one-week sponsorship integration during the summer games that featured broadcast spots among other on-screen elements. A first for Disney, the sponsorship also extended into the NBCU digital platforms, including social and Peacock.

“Another major theme was bringing the beautiful island environment, the sand, the beach and environments of Moana back into the world with big stunts and in unexpected ways” says Asad about another big component of the campaign. This included projection mapping for Moana 2 on the cliffs of Capri in Italy in addition to a sail boat. There was also Moana-themed set takeovers across Jimmy Kimmel Live!, The View, Live with Kelly & Mark, ESPN Sports Center and more. In Korea, there was a visual poster display at Haeundae beachside main road during the Busan International Film Festival on Oct. 2. There was also a Moana 2 tie-in with Univision’s Quien es la Mascara? (The Masked Singer) with a beach-to-set in-show backstage takeover segment and toss to special look on Nov. 24.

Diversity facets of the sequel’s push included a flower crown making segment to kick off a week-long takeover on Univision’s Despierta America in addition to a Polynesian Dancers bit. Moana 2 star Auli’i Cravalho had a multicultural press day with Univision and Telemundo. Media placements aimed at Latino and Hispanic moviegoers included spots on Telemundo, Univision, ESPN Deportes, Latin Grammy Awards, FireTV Spanish Language Feature Rotator.

“It calls to the importance of Moana to the studio. It’s the biggest movie of all-time on Disney+,” says Ayaz on the mammoth marketing for Moana 2.

“The characters appeal to so many different audiences around the world. In promoting the sequel, we wanted to not only bring audiences back to Motunui, but we knew we had an opportunity to expand the audience even further with Moana 2.”