Fox's 'Simpsons' Marketing Bookends on eBay

I'm not one to continually gush over studio marketing campaigns, but let's give credit where credit is due. Not only did The Simpsons Movie hold tight at the box office this weekend, taking the four spot with $6.7 million (and beating out flicks like Nicole Kidman's newly released The Invasion), its promotional items have been making a splash on eBay, the New York Times reports:

A search on eBay for "Kwik-E-Mart" yields more than 180 items, from a $1.99 Squishee cup to a $200 Kwik-E-Mart shirt. The asking price for a box of Krusty-O's is $10, the same as for a six-pack of Buzz Cola.

A spokesman for Fox Broadcasting, Gregg Brilliant, said the promotion had surpassed expectations: "Anytime you make something that appeals directly to a fan base, in a limited quantity, for a limited amount of time, naturally you are going to have a collectible value."

Rita Bargerhuff, a marketing director for 7-Eleven, said that all of the Kwik-E-Mart items had sold out, and sales from the promotion were "off the charts."

Dilip Chaudhari, the assistant store manager for a 7-Eleven in Manhattan that was transformed -- and where a Kwik-E-Mart shirt is for sale -- said the store had double the number of customers during the promotion. It was a "crazy month," he said.