When George Lucas set out to make the original Star Wars movie, he made a surprising deal with 20th Century Fox. The studio, which was on the verge of bankruptcy at the time, agreed to give Lucas the full rights to all Star Wars merchandise in exchange for passing up a $500,000 director’s fee headed his way. In hindsight, it’s clear that Fox made a mistake. Back in 2012 (right before Disney bought the franchise for $4 billion), the total merchandising profits from Star Wars were valued at a whopping $20 billion.
