Deals in the Making

Eavesdrop as you walk the aisles at this month’s Licensing International show and you’re bound to hear the word “exclusive” uttered at least a few times.

That’s because the current state of the economy has made exclusive licensing partnerships more desired than ever before.

“In licensing and retail, people are looking for exclusive relationships,” says Leigh Ann Schwarzkopf, manager of trademark licensing for General Mills. “But you have to stick to programs that suit the property. You lose your consumer if you go too far beyond what the brand stands for.”

General Mills just completed a six-week program with Minneapolis neighbor Target Corp. that sold an exclusive line of men’s and women’s sleepwear featuring spokescharacters and logos from Lucky Charms, Cheerios, Cocoa Puffs, and Trix brands in 1,000 stores.

Targeted to college students, the loungewear was displayed along with the cereal near front entrances and advertised in store circulars. (General Mills unveiled the line in March at a Target-sponsored spring break event in Panama City, FL.)

Schwarzkopf will be roaming the halls of New York City’s Jacob K. Javits Convention Center this month to find other interested partners at the annual show. Here’s a look at some of the other players who’ll be there ready to make some deals.

• New York City-based Classic Media makes its show debut this year to unveil new licensees for its Casper the Friendly Ghost property, among them a deal with a food company for a mass-market promotion. (Classic Media acquired rights to the property when it bought the non-publishing assets of Golden Books.) In light of Sept. 11, Casper will be positioned as a friendly alternative to mean spirits this Halloween through alliances with a safety organization and battery maker, among others, says John Fraser, Classic Media’s vp-marketing.

• San Francisco-based ShoPro USA will showcase Hamtaro, an animated TV series that premieres this month on Cartoon Network. The property has sold more than $2.5 billion worth of licensed product in Japan since launching there in 2000, says John Easum, vp-licensing and sales for ShoPro, a sister company of property owner Shogakukan Production Co. The program “is watched by a large age group, from kindergarten students up to grandparents,” Easum says. “While cartoons are much more for children in the U.S., we think it will reach a wide target audience.”

• Amsterdam, Netherlands-based Mercis BV returns to the show for a second year with its Miffy and Friends book series. Mercis will be looking to broker new deals via its North American licensing partner, New York City-based Big Tent Entertainment. The character got its own exhibit at Binney & Smith’s Crayola Factory in Easton, PA, last September. Next fall, the exhibit begins a tour of children’s museums around the country.

• Show mainstay Nickelodeon, New York City, will tout its many properties, including The Fairly OddParents (a one-year-old series on spin-off network Nicktoons) and Nick, Jr. property Oswald (which launched last August).

  “We are not under pressure to put product on the market before its time,” says Leigh Anne Brodsky, senior vp-consumer products at Nick, regarding the network’s licensing strategy. “We let the kids be our guide and wait until they want some kind of extension of the experience from the show.”

• Universal Studios is planning a “big marketing push” for Summer 2003 release The Incredible Hulk, says Amy Taylor, vp-marketing and creative for the studio’s Consumer Products Group, Universal City, CA. “These [comic book properties] are proven brands and we’re looking for blue-chip partners,” says Tim Rothwell, senior vp-marketing and licensing.

  Closer on the horizon is the holiday 2002 release of Dr. Seuss’ The Cat in the Hat. “We’re still enjoying the success of The Grinch, but with Cat, we don’t have the seasonal limitations,” Rothwell says. “It’s perennial, which will translate globally.”

• Los Angeles-based Twentieth Century Fox will be recruiting partners for a raft of TV series including recent premiere Greg the Bunny, upcoming series Time Tunnel and Firefly, as well as old standbys such as Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Dark Angel.

• Patch Products, Beloit, WI, will be on hand to find other partners like McDonald’s, Oak Brook, IL, with which it produces a line of board games. The toy maker is introducing three new McD-branded items that will be promoted via giveaways on Radio Disney stations nationally.

Patch this month releases a charade-style board game bearing the People magazine name. Joint promotions with publisher Time, Inc., New York City, are planned for the fourth quarter, according to Patch vp-marketing Tracy Dudkiewicz.