Red Fan played a key role in announcing Hill Country Studios and ensuring that our goal for Texas and the film industry was effectively communicated. Their skilled team aided in streamlining our strategic messaging, both internally and externally. Working with Red Fan was an absolute pleasure. Any objective we had, short or long term, they took on with enthusiasm. The entire process was less like working with a vendor or outside partner, but rather it felt like Red Fan was just another member of the Hill Country team.
Hill Country Studios
Texas’ largest film production and virtual production studio breaking ground in 2023
The Story
The COVID-19 pandemic was a stark time for the film industry. With movie theaters across the country shuttered, revenues at an all-time low and the vast majority of production workers out of work, one group of below-the-line filmmakers came together with a unique vision for the future of film and television production. The result was Hill Country Studios, a $267 million project breaking ground in Central Texas in early 2023 that will allow for generating greater efficiency at every level of the production process. At more than 300,000 square feet of studio space, Hill Country is the largest and most ambitious studio project ever to come to Texas—the finished project will feature 12 sound stages, 15 acres of outdoor production space and four workshops.
As native Texans, several of the founders of Hill Country Studios recognized the potential waiting for the film industry in Texas, a state with a wealth of production talent, strong local infrastructure and a track record of creating beloved films ranging from “Dazed and Confused” to “Urban Cowboy.” In addition to those strong industry resources, Texas’ well-regarded public universities and thriving arts culture converge to create waves of aspiring filmmakers eager to break into the industry.
Challenge
When it approached Red Fan Communications, Hill Country Studios’ team had an immediate and important deadline—the project would become public record in June 2022 at a local city council meeting as part of the development’s zoning approval process. Operating on a tight timeline, Red Fan created a robust announcement strategy that created a proactive and transparent line of communication between the studio and local community.
Solution
Red Fan’s approach to any major brand launch is to work in tandem with the client to identify core messaging pillars that are authentic, sustainable and connect with its target audience. For Hill Country, Red Fan recommended a strategic media relations campaign highlighting the following areas:
- The Hill Country founders’ Texas roots and practical experience working on film and television productions;
- Hill Country’s deployment of cutting-edge technology, including Virtual Production; and
- The reason behind choosing San Marcos for the project and the team’s vision for the future of the Texas film industry.
With a goal of creating local community and larger industry awareness, Red Fan developed essential messaging and an extensive media relations campaign. Because every brand should strive to own the dialogue in its own backyard, Red Fan leveraged its established relationships with reporters across Central Texas and forged hundreds of new connections with local media on behalf of the Hill Country team.
In addition to a robust tally of media relations campaigns, Red Fan coordinated media training and thought leadership sessions with several members of the Hill Country executive team. Red Fan used these meetings to create a shared understanding of the industry landscape, identify distinction in each thought leader’s perspective and experience and develop proactive pitching angles for future outreach. In the end, Hill Country was equipped with confident spokespeople schooled in interview best practices and capable of adeptly fielding media inquiries. The outputs from these thought leadership sessions were also used to fashion multiple media campaigns highlighting the specific film industry expertise of members of Hill Country’s executive team and the development of a robust crisis and media response playbook.
Results
The Hill Country Studios brand launched on June 8, 2022, receiving favorable coverage in dozens of high-impact local and trade outlets. From June to November, Red Fan’s media relations efforts generated 243 mentions for Hill Country, including coverage on all Central Texas local news broadcast stations. Over the six-month period, Hill Country has tracked with or outperformed major established studio projects in media coverage, including Trilith Studios and Pinewood Studios properties, despite the studio having yet to break ground.
Throughout its relationship with Hill Country Studios, Red Fan cultivated rapport with reporters at major local outlets and produced high-quality, repeated coverage of the project in the most-read local news outlets. Among those outlets were the Austin American-Statesman, San Antonio Express News and Community Impact. Red Fan’s work also led to coverage in major national outlets, such as AdWeek, and established connections with reporters at the New York Times and Hollywood Reporter. In just six months, Hill Country Studios was covered in over 30 outlets, including all local and industry-related media prioritized by the client.
In-depth thought leadership interviews with members of Hill Country’s executive leadership team created opportunities to initiate each team member as a credentialed film industry veteran with unique production expertise with the media. Moreover, Red Fan helped to strategically highlight the ways Hill Country plans to use its executives’ expertise to build a studio that aims to transform the film and television production industry by making production easier and more efficient for every member of the crew.
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