While Disney’s First Window distribution strategy for both scripted TV and movies is to go all-in on vertical integration to support Disney+, beyond this Disney is beginning to sell more content to third parties. Show Tracker showed recently who Disney has been selling second windows of Disney+ scripted series to, now Movie Tracker reveals the top buyers of second window films from Disney after a first window on Disney+.
Global SVOD like Netflix and Amazon Prime come out on top, acquiring multiple films across many different markets. So far the approach from Disney is to only sell content from its 20th Century or Searchlight labels in a second window, with Walt Disney Motion Picture titles - those most likely to be associated with the Disney+ brand - not being sold in a second window in the last two years.
Multi-Market deals make up a large proportion of the Amazon numbers, as Disney sold titles such as ‘Amsterdam’ and ‘Barbarian’ as second windows to the SVOD across nine different markets. Netflix has also engaged in these types of deals but on a smaller scale, taking ‘The Favourite’ in four markets and ‘Ford v Ferrari’ in three.
Past these two global players there are some local buyers managing to score second window sales from Disney. In Canada Bell Media’s Crave service picked up many high profile films under the former Fox labels such as ‘Barbarian’, ‘Amsterdam’ and ‘The Menu’. Meanwhile Nippon TV’s Hulu in Japan acquired four titles and Channel 4 in the UK acquired two.
Exclusivity is not guaranteed for second windows. For titles sold to Amazon in multi-market deals, many of these did in fact come off of Disney+ during their second window periods. But for the likes of Crave in Canada, most films instead remained on Disney+ while also being made available to Crave subscribers.
By focusing on monetising the content coming out from 20th Century Studios and Searchlight in the second window, Disney hopes to find a way to maximise the long term revenue for their movies without cannibalising the appeal of Disney+. With no immediate signs of the Walt Disney Pictures produced titles being sold in the second window, they can still claim their SVOD is the only place to watch the majority of their tentpole Disney franchises.
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