Marketing the Moon | Public Relations | Case Studies | Marketing | Advertising
The new film Fly Me to the Moon starring Scarlett Johansson & Channing Tatum is a romantic comedy set in the 1969 race to the moon. Johansson plays a marketing strategist planning a fake moon landing video in a NASA warehouse.
I’m thrilled my book Marketing the Moon co-written with Rich Jurek was an important inspiration for the film.
In our book, we researched how NASA sold the lunar missions to the American people. We interviewed Apollo astronauts including several who walked on the moon. We spoke with public relations professionals at NASA, reporters who covered the missions, and to marketers at contractors like Boeing.
The last few weeks have been super exciting as the detailed history of the marketing and PR aspects of the Apollo program that we wrote about in our 2014 book have suddenly been thrust back into the spotlight because of the film’s release.
As the experts in the marketing aspects of the Apollo program, Rich and I have done media interviews, and our book has been mentioned in dozens of news stories.
Establishing Authority
How cool is it when you establish authority in a subject, even an obscure one like what we wrote about, and suddenly your expertise is in demand!
As I said when our book originally came out a decade ago, I’m convinced the Apollo program is the most successful marketing and public relations campaign in history. Our book Marketing the Moon: The Selling of the Apollo Lunar Program features heroic astronauts, press-savvy rocket scientists, enthusiastic reporters, deep-pocketed defense contractors, and Tang.
Many of these elements (including Tang) make an appearance in the film. Fly Me to the Moon includes details we covered in our book including product placement by Omega watches and other companies.
No spoilers!
I saw the film and it is wonderful. I will go back to see it again and when it is available, I will purchase a DVD.
One of the most important PR projects for Apollo was the inclusion of live television from the surface of the moon. In Marketing the Moon, we covered many details of the struggle to get a TV camera in space. Some in NASA wanted live television to share the lunar landing with the world and others resisted because it was a difficult technological challenge. We told their stories.
Live television as a marketing strategy becomes a major storyline in the Fly Me to the Moon movie.
In a USA Today article: Is 'Fly Me to the Moon' based on a true story? What's behind fake moon landing movie, screenwriter Rose Gilroy was quoted as saying she looked to Marketing the Moon which details how NASA made the moon enticing to the masses through product placement, magazine articles and TV specials. “It’s about the original ads that were used, and how sci-fi was woven into the minds of the American people” using genre books and movies, Gilroy says. “That was instrumental. It was endlessly interesting to learn all the ways they sold” the Apollo 11 mission.
“As marketers and space enthusiasts, writing marketing the moon was a passion project, a labor of love,” my co-author Rich Jurek told me, and I totally agree! “Its reach and influence have exceeded every expectation,” Rich continues. “It’s a wonderful reminder that when you follow your passion, the payoff not only transcends monetary compensation, but can also lead to huge personal and professional opportunities. Instead of just focusing on Apollo as a technical and engineering achievement, Marketing the Moon literally changed the historic narrative by putting a much overdue and deserved spotlight on the pioneering marketing and PR efforts surrounding the program at both the contractors and NASA. In so doing, we’ve inspired two films and continue to influence a new generation’s perspective on a unique but vital aspect of the program.”
Here are several stories mentioning our book:
- TIME: Separating Truth From Fiction in the New Space Race Movie Fly Me to the Moon
- Hollywood Reporter: How ‘Fly Me to the Moon’ Writer Rose Gilroy Stopped at Nothing to Write for Scarlett Johansson
- Space.com: Marketing the Moon: How Space Collectors Retold the Story of Apollo's Success
- USA Today: Is 'Fly Me to the Moon' based on a true story? What's behind fake moon landing movie
I’ve often said my best nonfiction book ideas came from finding patterns in the universe that nobody else has written about. If you’re considering a nonfiction book, that should be your test: Is your idea a new way of looking at something?
Once you have that pattern identified, you need to share it! The more we give, the more we get back.
The importance of marketing and public relations to Apollo was a story waiting to be told. Rich and I saw the dedicated people who fought for live television and who worked to communicate with the public in ways they would appreciate is as heroic as what the astronauts did, and we were told their story in our book.
Thank you, Rose Gilroy, for your wonderful script. You expertly created a funny and warm film and told the stories of the thousands of NASA people in a caring and respectful way. For a comedy to also be rooted in reality is a tough needle to thread.
And thank you Rich for agreeing to co-author Marketing the Moon. When we first discussed the ideas that became this project some 15 years ago while we were at an Apollo event together, who would have imagined what it would lead to.
