Why Film Commissions Should be Wooing Unscripted Productions
They offer a lot of bang for the buck!
We get it.
Feature films and scripted series can be seductive: the big local spend, the small army of local hires, the prestige of saying Fast & Furious 10 was filmed in your country...
So why should film commissions bother with catering to relatively smaller unscripted productions?
Because unscripted productions–including lifestyle and factual content, reality shows, and documentaries–offer a number of benefits beyond the immediate local spend, including:
They tend to showcase your location. While locations in scripted content are frequently vague or might feature “cinematic stand-ins,” they’re often promoted in unscripted content, be it the booming culinary scene of a city, the affordable real estate of a quaint European town, or a beautiful beach resort playing host to a reality dating show. That can generate even more interest and investment in your location.
They foster a long tail tourism benefit. Don’t take my word for it – just ask Essie Mastellari, Head of the Panamanian Film Commission. Numerous unscripted series like The Bachelor have benefited from Panama’s cash rebate program, which offers a 25% rebate on productions spending more than $500,000 locally. In turn, the country has seen a return on that investment. In showcasing the natural beauty and diverse landscapes of the country, Essie notes, unscripted production “has undoubtedly contributed to Panama's growth in the tourism sector and its standing as a compelling destination in the eyes of travelers worldwide.”
Italy was the leading European destination for post-COVID travel among Americans in 2022, many surely inspired by Stanley Tucci: Searching for Italy (this was before White Lotus’s second season, mind you!).
They generate economic investment. Popular HGTV series Fixer Upper transformed the economy of Waco, Texas; when COVID shut down Fiji’s tourism industry (which normally accounts for 40% of its national revenue) its established Survivor production hub kept investment flowing.
They can help you develop your industry. With ever-tightening budgets, unscripted productions are filling more and more positions locally. Essie has witnessed this firsthand in Panama, with a “growth and development of the local production industry…creating employment opportunities, fostering skills development, and stimulating economic activity within the sector and its supporting industries.”
They can help buffer the impact of changes in the scripted industry. Where strikes and even AI threaten to disrupt the flow of scripted productions to your region, establishing it as a welcome place for unscripted can help buffer your local industry against such shocks. Panama’s reality-friendly cash rebate kept its industry humming during recent Hollywood strikes, and it’s continued to draw productions like Mr. Beast’s 7 Days Stranded at Sea, Naked & Afraid, and Life Raft in 2023.
“Hosting unscripted productions like reality shows offers unique advantages such as genuine local engagement, enhanced tourism promotion, economic impact on small businesses, and opportunities for cultural exchange and representation. These benefits contribute to the overall promotion and development of the destination while creating meaningful connections with audiences around the world.”
- Essie Mastellari, Head of the Panamanian Film Commission
So how can film commissions better target unscripted?
Make sure your minimum spend for incentives is in line with unscripted budgets. Your million-Euro minimum spend requirement might be an easy bar for scripted to clear, but it could be costing you countless unscripted productions. New Mexico’s generous incentive lacks a minimum spend requirement, making it incredibly enticing for unscripted; I’ve seen an uptick in producers researching and pitching ideas for unscripted content in West Virginia purely because of the low $50K minimum spend for its incentive. If you don’t already have one, consider a lower spending threshold for unscripted.
Consider other benefits. If you can’t offer an incentive to unscripted, are there other benefits you can extend, like location scouting assistance, media rates on rental cars, hotels, local airlines, and other vendor discounts? As budgets for unscripted shrink, every dollar counts, and such benefits could sway a production your way.
Go easier on incentives reporting requirements. Keep in mind that unscripted productions generally don’t have a big team of production accountants behind the scenes. While monthly reporting might be appropriate for scripted, consider a more flexible timeframe for unscripted.
Promote your location to the right people. Film commissions often target studio executives when pitching their locations, which makes sense given the extent to which studios influence location selection. For unscripted content, however, production companies rather than networks are often the main drivers behind location choice. If you’d like to lure the next beach reality show, survival show, historic home renovation series or culinary competition, find out which companies are producing that kind of content and pitch to them, not (just) the networks.
Film commissions: Need help luring unscripted productions? Want to brag about your own incentive in Production Incentives Insider?
Just reach out to us at carrie@globalcontentstrategies.com, or via our website.
Production Companies: We can help you match your company’s production and development slate to applicable locations that offer incentives.
Give us a shout at carrie@globalcontentstrategies.com.
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