Buyer Profile: KidsCo

KidsCo’s program director, Eileen McCarthy, and managing director, Paul Robinson, discuss the channel’s expansion and buying remit.

TV KIDS: What is the overall mission of KidsCo?
ROBINSON: KidsCo has been designed to be…complementary to the existing kids’ channels. We have huge admiration for Disney, Cartoon Network and Nickelodeon. What we’re trying to do is something different. We’re filling a gap in the market internationally, and this is for boys and girls 6 to 10 with family-safe programming. Overall, our strategy is to super-serve that audience with fantastic shows: family safe, no violence, no inappropriate content. If your child watches KidsCo, you know they’re going to have a great time, be entertained, get some educational programming, all in a safe environment.

TV KIDS: What is the channel’s strategy with commissioning and acquisitions?
MCCARTHY: KidsCo is a very young channel—our oldest channel is just two years old. We have started commissioning content, but at the moment the commissioned productions account for less than 10 percent of our schedule. We’ve produced two short-form series. One is a classic crafts show, Jass Time! That was our first production, which launched in April. In October we launched globally a short-form animated series that we co-produced with a company in Malaysia, [Inspidea], called Boo & Me. Every episode has an environmental message, underpinned by themes of friendship and learning, but learning through fun.

We’re two years old, so it’s certainly becoming more and more relevant for me to look at co-producing in various countries around the world, and, going forward, it’s certainly something that will take up a greater portion of my time.

TV KIDS: Are you looking to broaden KidsCo’s demographic?
MCCARTHY: From a programming perspective, I’m very keen to maintain a balance of boys and girls. I acquire movies globally—they’re an important part of our schedule—because it gives a co-viewing opportunity for parents to sit down with their kids and watch a movie that has those core values. Movies are definitely a strong part of the schedule around the word.

TV KIDS: What are some of your most recent acquisitions?
MCCARTHY: We recently acquired a range of classic content from FremantleMedia Enterprises. The shows fit the criteria of being very family-friendly viewing and are perennial favorites for kids. Kids love the strong characters, strong story lines and well-produced content, so we acquired DangerMouse, Count Duckula, Wind in the Willows and The BFG movies. I’m looking forward to bringing those titles across Western European. They’re classic characters, they’re perennial favorites and they certainly are a perfect fit for our brand.

We have also licensed Australian content from the Australian Children’s Television Foundation. One of the series is Round the Twist, an engaging story about a family who lives in a lighthouse.

TV KIDS: Do you have a stable of distributors you commonly look to for programming?
MCCARTHY: We have a mixture of licensing partners. Some are big studios, including FremantleMedia Enterprises and Nelvana and Cookie Jar. We have agreements with BBC Worldwide, MarVista Entertainment, Mondo TV and Fireworks International. As well as that, and very important, we do acquire from independent producers. I’m always looking to talk to independent companies. It always comes down to the content. I talk to big studios, I talk to local producers and I talk to independent production companies based around the world.

TV KIDS: Due to the tough economic climate, did KidsCo have to reduce its buying budget last year?
ROBINSON: No, our buying budget actually nearly doubled in 2009 compared to 2008. That’s because we’ve grown very rapidly as a channel. In the last year, we’ve launched on 38 new platforms—38 new cable and satellite operators—which is almost one a week. We’ve expanded to be in 60-odd countries, 16 or 17 languages. Our budget has gone up, it’s increased by over 80 percent year-on-year for programming.

It’s been a tough year, but we’ve had an amazing year for two reasons. One is that we’re new and we’ve got a very unique proposition in terms of how we fit into the market. Also, we’ve positioned ourselves as being a very good value for platforms. In an economy where money’s tight, KidsCo is a really good solution. If you want a really great-value kids’ channel with high-quality programming, we fit the bill.

As a result, we’ve done very well and, as you can see, we’ve grown. We’ve launched in countries as varied as Macedonia to Cyprus to Australia this year.

TV KIDS: What are the plans for the buying budget for 2010?
ROBINSON: It’s going to increase again. The forecast is for it to increase again by about 50 percent. That will also depend on the deals we do, but that’s the plan. The reason is that we’re going to be expanding in Western Europe over the next 12 months. Particularly in big countries like Germany, France, Spain, Italy and the U.K. We’ll need new programming to serve that Western European feed. So our spending will go up again this coming year.

Please click here to watch a video featuring KidsCo’s
programming highlights.