75% say video is essential to their marketing strategy
50% say the time it takes is the biggest barrier to producing more
47% say budget is a barrier to producing the content they want
7% are completely satisfied with their current video output

A Middle Table research film

Video works. When it works,
it really works.

So why does it so often fall short? We spoke to over 100 marketers about what actually gets in the way. Time. Budget. Approval processes. Creative decisions made by the wrong people at the wrong moment.

What they told us was honest, practical and recognisable. Commission Impossible draws on that research to explore the real barriers to producing video that delivers. Enter your details below to watch Part One free.

Free access

Watch
Part One

Part One of Commission Impossible explores the three barriers that came up again and again in our research: time, budget, and the approval processes that quietly slow everything down.

Fill in your details to watch the film. There is no sales follow-up. We made it because the conversation is worth having.

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About the film

An honest account
of a shared problem

For 50% of marketers, the single biggest barrier to producing more video is not budget or ambition. It is time. Yet 51% say they can get from idea to delivery in under four weeks when the conditions are right.

The gap between what is possible and what actually happens sits in the structures around the work. How briefs are written. Who signs things off. Whether the why behind a project is clear before production begins.

Commission Impossible does not point fingers. It names the patterns that most marketing teams will recognise, and starts to unpick why they are so persistent.

What you will take away

  • 01Why time is the barrier nobody expected, and what transparency across the business can do about it
  • 02How to shift approval culture from slow and implicit to fast and explicit
  • 03Why starting with the why, not the what, changes how budgets get released
  • 04What it actually means to sweat your video content and build real return on investment

What the film covers

Three barriers.
One honest conversation.

01 Time and Process Half of all marketers say time is their biggest barrier. Not budget. Not creative ambition. The film explores what gets in the way, and how clear strategy and the right production partner can change that.
02 Budget and Sign-off 47% say cost stands in the way. But as the film argues, budget is rarely the real problem. The real problem is not having a clear why before you ask for the money.
03 Quality and Originality Just 7% are fully satisfied with what they produce. The film explores what quality actually means, why predictable work gets ignored, and how to raise the creative bar without raising the budget.

Work with Middle Table

The best video work
starts before the brief.

Middle Table is a London-based video production company. We work with marketing and communications leaders who want a production partner that is as invested in the outcome as they are.

We do not just turn up and film. We help clients work out what kind of video they actually need, why they need it, and how to commission it in a way that gives it the best chance of delivering. The research behind Commission Impossible is part of how we think about that problem publicly.

If anything in this film has felt familiar, we would genuinely like to talk. Not a sales pitch. A conversation about what you are trying to do and whether we can help you do it better.

Start a conversation  →
Track record Over 12 years working with global brands including Google, Nokia, BBC and Salesforce.
What we do Brand films, documentary storytelling, campaign films, employer brand, internal communications and thought leadership content.
How we work We help clients commission better video, not just produce it. Strategy, story and production, joined up from the start.

"You are not afraid to come up with ambitious, outside-the-box ideas and you delivered to brief."

Anna Jones, Associated British Foods

From the film

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