Lisa Reiner of Omnicom-owned Beanstalk, talking about trends she saw at Brand Licensing Europe and the implications for marketers

Lisa Reiner, Managing Director of Beanstalk Europe and Asia Pacific writes …

Brand Licensing Europe (BLE) is a pan-European conference that draws together retailers, licensees, manufacturers, and sales professionals. In 2012, there were over 6,800 attendees from 73 countries. This year, over 280 exhibitors displayed more than 2,200 brands.

As a long-time exhibitor at the show, we noticed five prominent trends this year: the explosive growth of digital properties; the expansion of food licensing; the emergence of ‘boomerang licensing’; the battle for store space; and the continued importance of the younger generation.

For more information, visit www.beanstalk.com

What do these trends mean for marketers?

The explosive growth of digital properties

For years, the online space has been gradually migrating offline, but BLE 2013 made it clear that ‘gradual’ was no longer part of the equation. Thanks to apps, tablets, and social gaming, we are witnessing an explosion of brands moving from the digital space and extending into the physical world via creative licensing and brand extensions. We saw it at the show with properties like Rovio’s Angry Birds, Mind Candy’s Moshi Monsters, Imangi Studio’s Temple Run, and Lima Sky’s Doodle Jump, to name just a few.

The significance of this trend can’t be overstated for both licensors and licensees.  For digital brand licensors, the competition is certainly heating up.  While once upon a time the largest brands owned the entertainment space (i.e., Disney, Sega), the app explosion has evened the playing field.  Many of today’s largest digital franchises are coming from the unlikeliest places.  For example, in the three years since its founding, Angry Birds has expanded into theme parks, apparel, toys, and collaborations with major entertainment brands such as Star Wars.

The expansion of food licensing

@bleurope we looked for mentions of 30 exhibitors on Twitter during the show, @beanstalkgroup & @totallicencing were chart toppers!

— GleanIn (@GleanIn) October 18, 2013

From La Tasca to Hummingbird Bakery, food-related products are moving out of the restaurant or off the TV and into the home, both through food extensions and related non-food products. For instance, Metrostar’s The Great British Bake Off has proven a commercial success, with over one million books sold and a giftware range that won the best-selling range in Marks & Spencer in 2012. This trend suggests that consumers are looking to re-create the experience of restaurant dining while at home.

Boomerang licensing?

Earlier this year, Lego launched an all-white minimalist Lego set aimed at adults. It was part of a trend that we at Beanstalk are calling ‘boomerang licensing.’ In this trend, companies such as Lego are creating new products designed to appeal to an older generation by playing on nostalgia.  While the nostalgia trend isn’t new by itself, we think that the real beauty (and innovation) of the Lego example is that the new product line can actually have a boomerang effect: generating sales for Lego’s regular children’s product line by reminding adults of how much fun they used to have with Lego.  The new line in and of itself will never approach the sales of traditional Lego, but if it helps to rejuvenate sales of classic Lego products, then it will be a huge success.

We saw other examples of this trend at BLE. Kellogg’s Vintage was present with nostalgic designs for housewares and other products. The 1970s French character, Barbapapa, aimed at preschoolers and young adults, likewise reemerged with product releases scheduled for later this year and 2014 with Zara Home, H&M, and others. Uniqlo announced a tie-up with the Moomins, the Swedish-Finn characters that date back to 1945, for apparel collections for both women and children this autumn/winter. Even Betty Boop made a reappearance via a partnership between King Features Syndicate and Chupa Chups to co-brand the name and logo from the lollipop brand with the name and likeness of Betty Boop.  We think that all of these examples will ultimately exhibit a boomerang effect and support each brands’ core product lines.

The battle for store space

At this year’s BLE, there was a lot of chatter around that fact that hypermarkets and grocers are increasingly cautious over which brands they get behind. This is of course related to the slowing growth of brick-and-mortar stores and the growing trend of stores’ private label brands (e.g., ‘Sainsbury’s Basics,’ and ‘Tesco Value’).

Discounters will be the fastest-growing retail channel in Europe over the next five years, according to a Planet Retail presentation at BLE. The company noted that Europe’s largest discounters, Lidl and Aldi, are both adding licensing to their mix. Aldi has started carrying Smurf products, where Lidl has joined with Warner Bros. to offer Man of Steel products in 10,000 stores.

That’s not to say supermarkets have seized licensing, with brand licensing accounting only for 3.5% of retail sales in UK and Ireland. The Licensing Letter‘s Karen Ragust noted that while on a tour of Tesco, Sainsbury’s, and Waitrose, character licensing was surprisingly rare.

Younger generation continues to drive collaborations

At BLE, Mattel announced its new division, Playground Productions, dedicated to multiplatform storytelling, even as Warner Brothers announced the partnership between Sanrio’s Hello Kitty and DC Comics Super Heroes (set to debut in 2014). Likewise, Sanrio and Twentieth Century Fox Consumer Products announced a partnership to create a line of products featuring Hello Kitty and The Simpsons, scheduled to launch during the back-to-school season next year. These announcements, coupled with the fact that the total toy market in 2012 was worth $85 billion, indicate a clear trend: that the younger generation is still powerful, and that they are driving new unique and exciting collaborations.

What this all means for marketers

Today marketers are creators, inventing new products and services that will help foster authentic relationships between audiences and brands. Increasingly, they are achieving this through brand licensing, which, often misconstrued as a trademark protection tactic or a route to incremental revenue, is actually a strategic marketing craft tied to the concept of creating.

For this reason alone, shows like this year’s BLE that draw together industry professionals from all over the world offer important insights. Marketers must take note of the continued importance of children, and how ‘boomerang brands’ extend across all ages. They must consider the potential growth of brands within stores. They must also keep in mind the digital and food space, as both continue to grow and develop.

Lisa Reiner is the Managing Director of Beanstalk Europe and Asia Pacific. Beanstalk is an Omnicom-owned global brand licensing agency and consultancy that has represented many of the world’s most reputable brands, celebrities and entertainment properties since its inception in 1992. For more information, visit www.beanstalk.com