Chinese dairy brand seen in American TV show

A scene from Episode 17 Season 5 of The Big Bang Theory, a popular American sitcom, triggered online discussions among Chinese audiences. A carton of Shuhua milk distributed by dairy brand Yili Industrial Group was spotted on the table of the home of the two leading characters in the comedy, Sheldon and Leonard, the International Herald Tribune reported on April 2, 2012.

As more and more American movies and TV shows are introduced to China through online video websites and starting to gather bigger audience groups, Chinese enterprises have discovered a new way to promote their products - branching out overseas to target Chinese consumers.

According to industry insiders, China's product placement market is growing by 40 to 50 percent each year. China is going to introduce 14 more American IMAX or 3D movies starting this year while Chinese online video websites will also introduce more copyrighted American TV shows. China's product placement in American movies and TV shows is facing a bigger market, according to the newspaper.

The product placements of Chinese brands such as TCL, Yili, Meters/bonwe in the movie Transformers：Dark Of The Moon proved the promising future of this market. Statistics shows that the sales of Shuhua milk grew 12 percent year on year during the time the movie was released in China, the brand reputation also rose by 15 to 17 percent. Also, TCL's financial report last year showed that the brand's global sales of LCD TV from January to October last year reached 8.11 million, a 40.08 percent growth year on year.

"Chinese brands' product placements in Hollywood movies and popular American TV shows are greatly improving the consumers' awareness of the brands", Huang Qi with China Brand Research said, reported the newspaper.