Neil Ross Russell

Last month, BBC Worldwide further expanded its slate of children’s properties with the acquisition of the global distribution rights for TV, merchandise, DVD and publishing to ZingZillas. The new commission for  CBeebies is a musical show for preschoolers that premieres in the U.K. in spring 2010.

ZingZillas joins a portfolio of well-established kids’ titles in the BBC Worldwide catalogue, such as In the Night Garden and Charlie and Lola. Leading the exploitation of these titles and more is Neil Ross Russell, the managing director of children’s and licensing at BBC Worldwide. After taking on his post last year, Ross Russell embarked on a restructure of the division. He recently spoke with TV Kids about his goals for the business.

TV KIDS: What were your key priorities while reorganizing your division?
ROSS RUSSELL: Top of the list would be to put more focus on the brands we have in our portfolio. We have a very privileged position with our relationship with the BBC and also with the global independent community. When I arrived here, I didn’t think we were delivering the right level of service. It’s very important for us to be seen as the rights-management company of choice when it comes to children’s TV programs. We’ve put together a brand-management team that is responsible for each individual brand, so there is a real focus on pulling together all of the stakeholders—the broadcaster, the licensees, the magazine publishers, book publishers, all of whom are touching the brand in a different way.

The more internal focus for us at the BBC is to increase the profile of our adult brands, such as Top Gear, Planet Earth, Lonely Planet, Dancing with the Stars, which are very exciting brands and offer opportunities for us to grow the business.

The third thing we are looking at is international. We clearly have a privileged position within the U.K. with our relationship with the BBC, but internationally we are just another production company. And yet, we have been very successful in certain key markets, particularly in the U.S., with BBC America, which is the fastest-growing cable network in the U.S. and is doing very well for us. Our brands have some visibility internationally, but we didn’t really have the infrastructure in place to make the most of that.

TV KIDS: When launching properties internationally, what are the challenges and opportunities?
ROSS RUSSELL: The amount of children’s programming being played on free-to-air channels has decreased quite significantly over the last few years, for three main reasons. First, because with the increase of multichannel TV, quite a lot of the share of children’s viewing is moving over to cable and satellite channels. Second, the value of children’s advertising has decreased. So you’ve got just as many production companies out there coming up with just as many great new ideas, but they are chasing after a smaller number of hours and a smaller amount of money coming from those broadcasters. And third, when you look at the multichannel world, nearly every country in the world has got Disney Channel, Nickelodeon and Cartoon Network. Three fantastic businesses that are very sensibly vertically integrated, so they take their own programming and put it through their own global network of channels. So the challenge is primarily finding a platform which will give us the level of awareness we want for our property. TV is still the most powerful medium out there for building brands. But in the absence of being able to do a TV license deal with the best broadcaster, we have to be smarter about how else we can build awareness. And that can be through online, or retail promotions, or through DVDs.

TV KIDS: Is the U.S. market your top priority or are you looking at other markets as well?
ROSS RUSSELL: That is the top priority. In the children’s business model, increasingly, the largest proportion of the revenues comes from the ancillary businesses, such as merchandising. As the U.S. captures 50 percent of the licensed-product market, it’s the obvious target, but it’s difficult to break into cable. So we are looking at all sorts of ways of building brands in the U.S. Online and gaming and other new-media activities will provide a great opportunity for us.