Seeing Green

St. Patrick’s Day has become an increasingly important occasion for collaborations and promotions, as licensors and licensees consider holidays throughout the year as potential reasons to debut new products or highlight existing ones. While nowhere near as big as more high-profile milestones such as Halloween, Valentine’s Day, Earth Day, and the like, St. Patrick’s Day presents an opportunity for a variety of properties, especially (but not limited to) those with a real or fictional connection to Ireland.

Some examples from this year:

• General Mills’ Lucky Charms brand introduced a variety of merchandise along with the release of its limited-edition Lucky Charms cereal, which turns the milk green. Products include a board game (Lucky’s CharmWorld by Candy Land) from Hasbro, Jibbitz shoe charms from Crocs, special flavors of ice cream and shakes from Cold Stone Creamery, and a video e-card from JibJab.
• Jameson paired with creative agency Fly Nowhere’s soccer-inspired lifestyle brand and “artificial football club,” Nowhere FC, for a capsule collection of hand-dyed football shirts, bucket hats, scarves, a bar towel, and a pin badge. Each shirt has a co-branded patch with a “7” to represent the luck of the Irish. The collection is available on the Jameson and Fly Nowhere’s Football Café e-commerce sites.
• Guinness and Carhartt rejoined for another collection, after collaborating on a capsule last year as well. This year’s effort includes hooded sweatshirts, t-shirts, hats, four-pack insulated beverage slings, and other items (a total of 20 products) positioned as being designed for hard-working men and women. Prior to their first joint capsule in 2020, the two companies had paired for charitable efforts.
• Disney/Lucasfilm issued a Star Wars Green Gift Guide featuring existing products such as t-shirts from Fifth Sun and Tee Turtle, bobbleheads and keychains from Funko, moccasins from Ground Up, pajamas from Hanna Andersson, a sweatshirt from Heroes & Villains, a concept maquette from Regal Robot, green tea from The Republic of Tea, a green diamond pendant from Star Wars Fine Jewelry, books from Disney-Lucasfilm Press and DK Publishing, and a holiday mug from Zazzle. Most of the offerings are not St. Patrick’s Day-specific but highlight green hues; Baby Yoda/The Child/Grogu, who is both green and a current hit, is featured prominently, along with other characters and icons.

Meanwhile, Hot Topic and Box Lunch are among the retailers calling out St. Patrick’s Day-relevant merchandise, both highlighting a number of Star Wars t-shirts within their St. Patrick’s Day collections. These sit next to the likes of Mickey Mouse, Lilo & Stitch, Care Bears, SpongeBob (and Patrick), and Super Mario at Hot Topic; Box Lunch offers Mario, The Hulk, Black Panther, Groot, Minnie Mouse, and more. Some of the products have specific holiday themes, but many are simply green and/or feature phrases about luck, making them appropriate for but not limited to the season.

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