National Lampoon and IndiePix look to the new frontier with The Orchard

The Orchard announced that it has formed comprehensive marketing, distribution, and services partnerships with National Lampoon, IndiePix Films and Independent Film Sales. With these collaborations, the company will provide marketing and digital distribution services for National Lampoon, one of the oldest and most recognized comedy entertainment brands in the world. As part of the agreement, The Orchard will act as National Lampoon’s exclusive film distributor for iTunes and work with the company to secure additional, targeted premium retail opportunities. The initial titles will include National Lampoon’s Bagboy, with Dennis Farina, Larry Miller and Brooke Shields, and National Lampoon Presents Electric Apricot: Quest for Festeroo, a jam band mockumentary by Primus bassist Les Claypool, with appearances by Mike Gordon (Phish), Warren Haynes (The Allman Brothers Band), Bob Weir (Grateful Dead), South Park creator Matt Stone, Seth Green and many other films.

The Orchard has broad video distribution agreements encompassing industry leaders including iTunes, Amazon, Hulu and other top online video services. After expanding its proprietary encoding and delivery infrastructure, called V.E.C.T.O.R., to encompass everything from short episodic to full-length HD videos, The Orchard has embarked on a wave of new content signings.

The Orchard offers an array of additional entertainment services to its film clients from creative music searches, music supervision/clearance and global soundtrack distribution to interactive marketing, iPhone applications and other innovative forms of marketing. Last year, The Orchard snagged the award as the 33rd Fastest Growing Company in North America, a ranking of the 500 fastest growing technology, media, telecommunications, and life sciences companies.