Even though the V.I. Tourism Department has begun production of a new set of TV advertisements sure to calm local hoteliers, it must now contend with disgruntled local filmmakers.
Eric Zucker, of St. Thomas-based Flicks Productions, said his experience dealing with Tourism’s new advertising agency, international behemoth Ogilvy and Mather, has left him wondering who is in control of the latest ads that are intended to market the territory. It also has him questioning the government’s long-standing mantra of using local companies whenever possible.
On Feb. 9, Zucker’s associate producer, Deborah Quaid, began negotiations with Ogilvy and Mather to produce three 30- second spots highlighting each of the territory’s islands. After an initial consultation with the ad agency, Zucker said his company, which produced Tourism’s last TV promotion in 1997, bid $250,000.
Zucker and Quaid were told that figure was too high. So to accommodate the agency, they asked for a detailed scope of work and brought back another bid of $135,000, Zucker said. Too high again.
After yet another consultation that supposedly outlined the exact needs of the production, Zucker and Quaid brought in a final bid of $104,000 – just $4,000 above the agency’s price.
But the local filmmakers lost the bid to an Ogilvy and Mather off-island production company. The reason given, Zucker said, was because his and Quaid’s scope of work in the final bid – after consultation with the agency – was "inflexible."
"We negotiated and then all of a sudden we were told no," Quaid said. "We were led to believe we were negotiating with them and that we’d get the job."
"We bid it as a normal job," Zucker added. "We dramatically cut the numbers down but with the stipulation that we didn’t need certain things in the contract – we consulted with them. Then they told us we were too inflexible."
Zucker said he wasn’t expecting to have the job handed to his company – the only film company in the territory – on a silver platter. But it made sense to go with a hometown outfit, he said, because it is local, it has experience producing national- and international-caliber work, it understands local permitting needs and it doesn’t have to pay for travel or accommodations.
"It was the best thing at all levels," Zucker said. "I don’t want to assign blame because I haven’t quite figured it out."
Acting Tourism Commissioner Pamela Richards didn’t return calls Monday and a representative from Ogilvy and Mather couldn’t be reached for comment.
However, the person who coordinates the majority of film shoots in the territory, Manny Centeno, director of the government’s Film Promotion Office, said he was left out of the loop on production of the Tourism ads. Centeno’s office is within the Tourism Department, but he said he wasn’t aware of the bidding process.
Centeno did say, though, that the territory has top-flight production professionals who could easily have taken on the Tourism job. He added that whenever possible he tries to use local production crews.
"People come to us from all over the world. My job is to prove our capabilities," Centeno said. "But unfortunately I wasn’t intimately involved with this project.
"Those people (Zucker and Quaid) are certainly capable."
Meanwhile, the filmmakers believe it was disingenuous for the ad agency to request a specific scope of work and then in the end say they were not flexible.
"In the end, in my opinion, the agency manipulated Tourism to go with its cronies," said Quaid. "I want to see what they are providing versus what work we gave for $100,000."
Zucker, born and raised on St. Thomas, said he is looking at the experience in a larger context: what it takes to stay in business in the U.S. Virgin Islands.
"I want to work," he said. "But there is no point in struggling if my own government doesn’t give me a job that I am prepared for."
"Natural Forces," a video feature Zucker directed, was screened on the opening night of the Reichhold Center for the Arts premiere International Film and Video Festival last month. He's under contract to direct a full-length feature film in California later this spring.
