{"id":10359,"date":"2016-06-24T09:30:38","date_gmt":"2016-06-24T13:30:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/tvkids\/"},"modified":"2016-06-27T09:37:23","modified_gmt":"2016-06-27T13:37:23","slug":"dhx-brandss-tom-roe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/dhx-brandss-tom-roe\/","title":{"rendered":"DHX Brands\u2019s Tom Roe"},"content":{"rendered":"

Tom Roe, commercial director at DHX Brands, tells <\/em>TV Kids\u00a0about the L&M strategy for the brand-new <\/em>Teletubbies.<\/em><\/p>\n

Following their 1997 debut on British television, the Teletubbies<\/em> became a global sensation, airing in 120-plus countries and reportedly generating more than $1 billion in merchandise sales. In 2013, DHX Media acquired Ragdoll, the producer of the landmark preschool show, and in 2014 inked a deal with CBeebies to bring back the much-loved brand with 60 new episodes. The refreshed iteration, produced by Darrall Macqueen, was recently commissioned for a second season. DHX Brands, DHX Media\u2019s brand-management and consumer-products arm, was at Licensing Expo to tout the brand-new version. Tom Roe, commercial director at DHX Brands, talks\u00a0<\/em>about plans for Tinky Winky, Dipsy, Laa-Laa and Po in the retail space.<\/p>\n

\"***Image***\"TV KIDS:<\/strong>\u00a0Teletubbies<\/em> is already such a well-established brand. What\u2019s your L&M strategy for the new version?
\nROE:<\/strong>\u00a0The original\u00a0Teletubbies<\/em>\u00a0was an absolute phenomenon for L&M. The characters are very appealing\u2014cuddly, bright and colorful\u2014and resonate strongly with a young preschool audience. So, when DHX Media acquired\u00a0Teletubbies<\/em>, it was decided our focus for the new series would always be about not losing their core appeal: it\u2019s evolution rather than revolution, updating them and modernizing them for a 21st-century audience. That includes not just how the show is made in terms of production techniques, but also elements within the show, such as the Touch Screen tummy TVs and the hi-tech Tubby Phone. We\u2019ve had huge success so far in terms of broadcast and initial merchandise sales in the U.K. and it\u2019s now about replicating that elsewhere. The U.S. is a huge priority for us. We have a DHX Brands operation, based in Los Angeles, and we channel our business through our agents, CPLG North America. They\u2019ve brought forward numerous deals, filling many of the initial key categories, including Spin Master as master toy, VTech for ELAs [interactive electronic toys] and Hybrid for apparel, as well as stacks of other best-in-class licensees.<\/p>\n

TV KIDS:<\/strong>\u00a0Do you have to have product on shelves when the show launches or do you tend to let the property build on TV first?
\nROE:<\/strong>\u00a0We definitely give it time to build. Teletubbies<\/em> is a unique property in that it\u2019s new but it also has a heritage. It ticks both boxes. As a result, the opportunity is there to accelerate the time frame if we choose. Normally we\u2019d like to get the broadcast launch, build the popularity and awareness first. We have a new audience\u2014it\u2019s been 20 years since Teletubbies<\/em> was first conceived\u2014so it\u2019s about making sure we introduce the property to a new generation and really seed it well, making sure people pick up on it and fall in love with it, and then we launch toys. We\u2019re looking to build this as a long-term proposition. This is not something we think is a two- or three-year business\u2014Teletubbies<\/em> is evergreen, with real longevity. Going too quickly in terms of launching products and categories after broadcast is definitely a way to increase the risk of having a shorter-term piece of business overall.<\/p>\n

TV KIDS:<\/strong>\u00a0What opportunities are you seeing outside of big brick-and-mortar retailers like Target and Walmart?
\nROE:<\/strong>\u00a0If you have a fairly niche property, you might want to be in more of a specialist retailer. You generally have a handful of lead retailers and then there\u2019s everyone else. Those \u201cbig-box\u201d ones have the scale and the reach. They\u2019re going to make a significant difference to awareness and revenue performance. One big challenge with the big retailers is that they\u2019re supporting a relatively small number of brands. It\u2019s the high-profile, big, blockbuster brands. That creates a lot of opportunity for the smaller retailers to have more ownership over certain properties. A lot of it is about mass-market and big volumes, and that comes back to the big-box retailers, who are, when we\u2019re looking at a property like Teletubbies<\/em>, absolutely top priority.<\/p>\n

TV KIDS:<\/strong>\u00a0What are retailers looking for?
\nROE:<\/strong>\u00a0It\u2019s all about a point of difference. One of the major frustrations for a lot of retailers is that they’re going to a competitor’s store and seeing pretty much exactly the same product being offered. It doesn’t need to be a pure exclusive. It could be a design exclusive or an initial first to market. It\u2019s about coming up with tailor-made solutions for these retailers, rather than simply offering the same or similar solutions to everyone. If you can do that, you\u2019ve given that retailer a point of difference over its competition\u2014that\u2019s getting down to what they are after.<\/p>\n

TV KIDS:<\/strong>\u00a0What are your primary digital categories?
\nROE:<\/strong>\u00a0While e-books are interesting, for the preschool sector traditional print picture books are still extremely important.<\/p>\n

For our preschool properties, it\u2019s really all about apps: the world of apps and mobile games is huge. It\u2019s a great consumer touchpoint; quite often this is a shared parent-and-child activity. That helps the parent buy into the show as well. We tread carefully here. It\u2019s not really about being commercial; it\u2019s about taking the essence and key elements of the brand and translating them into an app\u2014and that app having great benefits for the child. It doesn\u2019t need to be overtly educational\u2014at the preschool age, it\u2019s all about enjoying play, which is something that is embraced a lot more in today\u2019s world than it was in previous generations. With a lot of the apps we\u2019ve been doing on Teletubbies<\/em> and some of our other properties, the bottom line is that they\u2019re fun to play. They may help the child with dexterity or numeracy, but they\u2019re good fun at the same time.<\/p>\n

TV KIDS:<\/strong>\u00a0Given the sheer volume of apps out there, how do you get parents and kids to find you?
\nROE:<\/strong>\u00a0That comes down to working with the right app developer, coming up with the right product, and making sure that those guys are working well with Apple and doing things that will help get your app featured. It comes down to consumer feedback: people look at the ratings. If you come out with a quality product and it gets picked up early and you start to get those ratings, then it can snowball. It\u2019s the consumer-driven endorsement that really helps.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The division’s commercial director talks about the L&M strategy for the brand-new Teletubbies.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":290,"featured_media":10360,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pmpro_default_level":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[15,21],"tags":[149,178,200,1436],"class_list":["post-10359","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","","category-interviews","category-top-stories","tag-dhx-brands","tag-dhx-media","tag-teletubbies","tag-tom-roe","pmpro-has-access"],"yoast_head":"\nDHX Brands\u2019s Tom Roe - TVKIDS<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/dhx-brandss-tom-roe\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"DHX Brands\u2019s Tom Roe - TVKIDS\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The division's commercial director talks about the L&M strategy for the brand-new Teletubbies.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/dhx-brandss-tom-roe\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"TVKIDS\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2016-06-24T13:30:38+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2016-06-27T13:37:23+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/9\/2015\/09\/2016-06-23-TomRoe-web.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"1\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Mansha Daswani\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Mansha Daswani\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"5 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/dhx-brandss-tom-roe\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/dhx-brandss-tom-roe\/\",\"name\":\"DHX Brands\u2019s Tom Roe - TVKIDS\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2016-06-24T13:30:38+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2016-06-27T13:37:23+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/#\/schema\/person\/83da304c8bad8bfdb3edd7eb47cfe5ad\"},\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/dhx-brandss-tom-roe\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/dhx-brandss-tom-roe\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/dhx-brandss-tom-roe\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"DHX Brands\u2019s Tom Roe\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/\",\"name\":\"TVKIDS\",\"description\":\"\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/#\/schema\/person\/83da304c8bad8bfdb3edd7eb47cfe5ad\",\"name\":\"Mansha Daswani\",\"description\":\"Mansha Daswani is the editor-in-chief and associate publisher of World Screen. 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