The Deeper meaning to it all.

[Lathriel]

I always have trouble with these topics because they make it all sound so negative. I believe that New Line took on the movie because they saw the potential. However I don't think that PJ began LOTR for this reason. In fact most of the people who worked on this project did it because they love LOTR. Most of them didn't get payed a lot. Besides people such Alan Lee helped with the movies. Alan Lee joined because (as you can see by his illustrations) he loved to design ME. So there are lots of people like that who were involved in the project.
Of course this doesn't mean that everybody went into the project without thinking of the money.
Obviously New Line knew that if the movies succeeded it would be a huge benefit for them. Besides, most of the comercial things came after the first movie's success and not before. Its mainly other companies (e.g Gameshop) who take advantage of the movie. However I don't think the movie itself was completly geered on consumers.