• by Todd Wasserman , March 22, 2022

Apple TV’s third season of “Ted Lasso” is shooting right now and is set to premiere on July 23.

Among the plot points fans hope to visit are whether Ted's former underling Nate Shelley will emerge as Ted's nemesis now that Nate's joined a rival squad and called Ted a liar and a phony. Also, whether Roy and Keeley will renew their relationship, and whether Sam and Rebecca will reunite.

But there’s little speculation about the show’s product placement. In its first two seasons, “Ted Lasso” featured an average of one Apple product placement every minute, according to a post in The Wall Street Journal analyzing 74 episodes of top Apple TV shows. For “Ted Lasso,” that included views of more than 300 iPhones, 120 Macbooks and 40 pairs of AirPods.

Even a casual viewer is apt to notice such placement, but they’ll likely reason that since it’s Apple TV, its shows aren’t likely to feature Samsung phones or Dell laptops. As a result, that study of Apple TV shows reveals that product placement is most effective when it ties an Apple technology, like FaceTime, to the plot.

Apple’s not the only brand doing product placement these days. Movies like “Bad Boys for Life” and “Wonder Woman 1984” have included millions of dollars worth of product placement, according to Bloomberg Businessweek. But Apple is among the brands doing the most advanced form of product placement. Director Rian Johnson has noted that Apple doesn’t let bad guys use iPhones in movies.

Such placement rules have been in place for some time. In 2002, Apple let heroes in the TV show “24” use Macs, but the villains used Windows PCs, according to Wired.

Apple’s strategy is not to pay for product placement, but to provide free product for such placements. “Apple won’t pay to have their products featured, but they are more than willing to hand out an endless amount of computers, iPads, and iPhones,” producer Gavin Polone told BusinessWeek.