The surprising way Amazon uses Pinterest to develop original TV shows (AMZN)
Amazon Studios director Roy Price thinks that “writing stuff down is the old way.”
Price, who is in charge of Amazon’s original shows like “Transparent” and “Mozart in the Jungle,” tells Hollywood Reporter that he developed those and other shows with pictures on Pinterest, instead of with words.
“I have notions for the show, but I don’t write anything down,” Price says. “Get a hundred pictures that really capture it and put them on Pinterest and you don’t have to pitch — you can just show people.”
It seems to be working: “Transparent” made history earlier this year when it won a Golden Globe for the best TV comedy and crowning Amazon as the first online streaming service ever to take home a prize. That prize prompted CEO Jeff Bezos to decalre that Amazon is also the first company to use a Golden Globe to sell toilet paper.
The production house spent more than $100 million on original video content in Q3 of 2014 alone, a cost it justifies with the “sell more toilet paper” idea.
Amazon hopes that having a slew of great original shows will convince more people to sign up for its $99-a-year membership service, Amazon Prime. The more Prime members, the better: Subscribers spend more than double on the site than non-members do.
Bezos told Hollywood Reporter that when Amazon Studios plans its content, he encourages the team to take risks:
One way you can think about TV is you can say, “I want to make something that millions and millions of people are going to watch.” If that’s your starting point, you paint yourself into a corner and you often end up with homogenized, uninteresting content. If you say, “Let’s hire the world’s greatest storytellers. Let’s encourage them to take risks,” then you’re going to end up with a remarkable story, and remarkable stories always find an audience.
SEE ALSO: Add this to our list of ways you didn’t know you could use Pinterest
Join the conversation about this story »
NOW WATCH: We tried the ‘belly button challenge’ that’s taking over China — and it’s way harder than it looks
