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MUSEUM & HERITAGE FEEDBACK
Emma Saunders, head of brand licensing and business development, Historic Royal Palaces “At the start of the year, we were meeting new potential licensees, then when COVID-19 hit, most of these discussions initially went on hold, but we are now picking up on these again. We are also looking at different types of licensing opportunities and collaborations, including digital, character and entertainment brands. Lockdown initially affected our ways of working, but we have adapted well and have maintained continuous contact with all our licensees and have still sought new business conversations where possible. We have been able to continue to develop licensed ranges with our existing partners and are gradually moving forward again with negotiations on new deals. Following the success of the first Tower of London coin series with The Royal Mint, we are launching a Above: A collection of wallpapers is among the second series of collectable coins new launches for Historic Royal Palaces. this year. This partnership has been one of our fastest growing licences to date. We are also about to launch a new collection of wallpapers with Cole & Son, while Flame Tree Publishing launches two new calendars for 2021 in August. In Q1 2021 we will be launching a
Rebecca Stanford, brand licensing manager, National Trust “In spite of the challenging circumstances 2020 has presented to every organisation and individual, we are really proud to be moving forwards with some exciting collaborations across our core licensing categories. Most recently, we have launched our first childrenswear collection for autumn/winter 2020 with Frugi, a UK leading ethical and organic children’s Above: National Trust clothing company. We are also delighted to be moving into the wildlife has moved forward on a number of care space through a new collaboration collaborations, says with CJ Wildlife. Rebecca Lockdown certainly brought its challenges across the organisation and our licensing programme was not exempt. We had to quickly adapt to managing our portfolio of licensees (which is fairly sizeable, at just over 30 accounts) with a heavily reduced team (due to furlough arrangements). Our priority was to support our licensees through these extreme trading conditions, yet also be mindful of our new working relationships and support them with product development and marketing launches to ensure we didn’t miss opportunities later in the year and into 2021.”
range of fine jewellery with our licensee Clogau. As a key licensee that’s been especially profitable for us over the years and although they have also been hit by the pandemic, they still see our licensed ranges as key to invest in and the new collections will be one of their first launches in the new year. We have also started to work on a completely new collection of coins to launch in AW 2021 and are about to start working on a number of new homeware collections to launch in SS 2022.”
Lauren Sizeland, head of licensing and business development, V&A “The whole brand licensing team has worked throughout the lockdown period. The first thing we focused on was contacting our licensees to understand how the shutdown affected each of their businesses and to identify how best we could support them. Of course many have had to adapt their plans, changing ranges and routes to market, altering production and launch schedules as demand has shifted and we are supporting them throughout. The global closure of many factories, shops and businesses provided obstacles but we found there was a natural expansion in certain product categories as a result of the changing market. We saw a particular increase for home décor and crafting as people spent more time at home. Our crafting licensees DMC and Ehrman Tapestries saw an unprecedented surge in demand for their Above: Lauren says embroidery and needlepoint products, and we worked closely with several of our home interior licensees to create inspirational marketing and social media promotions. The success of these has led the V&A found there was a natural to the development of additional ranges due to be released this autumn. Stationery products expansion in certain remained popular as people switched to work from home and chose home office supplies with moreproduct categories. personality. There are new product types we could have never anticipated a few months ago for items such as face masks and we are responding to that with some highly decorative designs, both for the UK and markets in South East Asia. Hopefully they will put a smile on everybody’s faces, even if we can’t see them! We are currently working on 17 forthcoming launches due to take place between AW20 to early 2021. There will be some exciting debut ranges, including a manufacturer of bespoke decorative glass for interior wall décor and crafting fabrics with Visage Textiles. We also have a lot of online activity planned in the coming months, particularly in China, including live streaming to promote our licensed products. We launched our first video platform account on Kuaishou in August and have more activities planned with Tmall later this year, with a focus on 11/11, one of the key shopping events in China.”
LICENSING SOURCE BOOK EUROPE 2020
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