With their bright colors and pop-culture references, painters identified as pop artists, from Roy Lichtenstein to Damien Hirst, have been attractive as licensing and collaboration partners almost since they first came on the scene in the 1950s. The past year is no exception as pop artists, both current and classic, have been expanding their licensing […]
Archive | Licensing
Prom Dates
Last month Discovery Consumer Products and Macy’s announced they were extending their licensing agreement for Discovery’s Say Yes to the Prom, creating a new line of dozens of prom dresses and accessories for high school girls. Say Yes to the Prom is a community-outreach spin-off of the Discovery series Say Yes to the Dress that […]
Shopping the Super Bowl
American football fans are gearing up for the Super Bowl this weekend. Not surprisingly, the NFL, the local organizing committee, and retailers across the Twin Cities—this year’s host site, U.S. Bank Stadium, is located in Minneapolis—are highlighting Super Bowl LII merchandise. Their activities provide a good illustration of what big-event licensing programs look like. The […]
Personal Identity
Celebrities take different approaches when it comes to labeling their licensed product arrays, as they try to reach a balance between capitalizing on their fame and establishing a merchandise program that can thrive on its own merits. The first option is for fan-favorite personalities to conduct their licensing and collaboration activities under their own names, […]
Breaking New Ground
A handful of deals announced in the latter half of 2017—all focused on the food and beverage industry but involving different property types—illustrate some of the ways licensors and licensees can innovate, even in a very crowded landscape: Creating something brand new. In December, the Portland Trail Blazers paired with Brew Dr. for a special-edition […]
Bollywood and Beyond
Celebrity brand extension through licensing and other means has been on the rise in India of late, as famous faces from a variety of sectors introduce merchandise programs. The personalities’ efforts often (but not always) revolve around brands they have developed, rather than their names alone. Some key segments include: Cricket players. Virat Kohli, captain […]
Giving Voice to Smart Electronics
One of the biggest topics of conversation at this year’s Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas was the prominence of voice assistants such as Amazon’s Alexa, Google’s Assistant, Apple’s Siri, Samsung’s Bixby, Roku’s Entertainment Assistant, and Microsoft’s Cortana. Not only are such voice assistants associated with smart speakers (e.g., Amazon’s Echo or Google’s Home), which […]
Bringing Culinary Content to Life
Much of the attention when it comes to brand-extension licensing in the food and beverage industry focuses on food, restaurant, chef-, and diet-related brands. Another active sector, albeit smaller, consists of culinary magazine titles. A number of cooking publications have expanded their names into retail food categories from frozen entrées to shelf-stable sauces. Two deals […]
Team Mentality
The biggest entertainment/character licensors and their licensees are enhancing fans’ sense of belonging and engagement with a bit of team spirit. Initiatives take different forms: Choosing sides. Several of Disney/Lucafilm’s licensed Star Wars products, from NVidia’s computer graphics processing units (GPUs) to Ample Hills’ ice cream, give consumers two alternatives from which to select, the […]
Watching Women’s Sports
Sales of licensed products tied to women’s pro sports have always been a fraction of what men’s leagues, teams, players associations, and events bring in. That remains true today. But there have been signals over the past couple of years that this still-small sector may be poised for expansion: In November, the NFL Players Association, […]