Once a year, about one hundred companies seeking dominant positions in China’s booming economy, compete in an auction for television advertising time. They face off on CCTV, China’s most watched (and only national) network, serving the 400 million television owners in China. The companies know they cannot afford to miss out on the make- or-break advertising slots. This film reveals China’s hectic embrace of market economics presenting a close look at the TV ad auction and the companies bidding .

The Longliqi cosmetics and toiletries company, the largest of its kind in China, employs 30,000 people and projects annual sales of US $19 billion by 2019. Understanding the importance of national TV advertising, Longliqi recently spent US $47.6 million for prime time ads on CCTV and cut its retail prices 30-50% in order to beat back competition from both Chinese and foreign companies like Proctor & Gamble.

Likewise, the largest motor oil company in China bought a commercial spot on CCTV in 2004 and produced an ad showing several expensive foreign cars using the company’s oil. This appeared to give the oil upper class cachet, resulting in local wholesale merchants throughout China ordering huge amounts of the oil. As for CCTV, because of its tremendous ad revenues, the state-owned network has been self- sufficient since 1992.