In December 1974, Norman Lear and his entertainment company, Tandem Productions, created a pilot for his new serial, "Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman", a satire of the impact of American consumerism. The pilot, consisting of two episodes and shot on a $100,000 (equal to $ today) budget, was not picked up by the networks. Lear then pursued a syndication strategy by hiring a sales agent to sell the show at the 1976 National Association of Television Program Executives (NATPE) market in San Francisco.