Aardman’s Laura Burr and Matthew Walker on developing Lloyd of the Flies – and building the brand

Laura, Matthew – thanks for joining us! You’ve just passed an important broadcasting milestone: Lloyd of the Flies is a year old! For those unfamiliar with it, what’s it about?
MW: Lloyd of the Flies is a comedy that follows the misadventures of a housefly called Lloyd, along with his best friend Abacus the woodlouse. He’s usually joined by his little sister PB too. Lloyd is very good at getting himself into bother and he’ll always make a situation worse before he makes it better.
It’s all set within a human home. Lloyd and his family live in a compost bin in the kitchen and there are lots of other household insects who feature in the series.

An excellent conceit! How’s it going down?
LB: Lloyd of the Flies launched last September on CITV and with great partners of ours like ZDF in Germany and ABC in Australia. We even launched this show as a Tubi original in the States, marking it as the first kids ‘original’ that Tubi got behind. It’s still very early in the brand’s lifecycle and we know it takes time to find and build an audience, but we’re really pleased with the reaction to the show.

The series has performed well for all our broadcast partners, both on the channel and on ITVX and we’ve had lots of messages on social media from kids – and adults – who already love Lloyd! And we were delighted that it was included in the official selection for TV Film at the Annecy Festival and has been nominated for some awards.

MW: I think it’s going down well. I’ve been really happy with the outcome generally, and it’s been nominated for a few awards which is great. What’s been most rewarding is when I’ve met people with no connection to the production who have told me they’re fans, or their kids are fans. I visited the Lloyd of the Flies trail in Wisley that the RHS gardens ran over the summer, and seeing kids get excited about the characters was really lovely.

What inspired this idea in the first place? How did it come about?
MW: Aardman did an internal callout for ideas in 2015, primarily looking for children’s series. I didn’t have an existing idea but wanted to pitch something. I liked the idea of making a series about insects and then came up with the title first and worked backwards from that – working out who this fly called Lloyd was.

Start with the end in mind! And after that starting point, how do you develop an idea for Aardman?
MW: My original pitch was very loose, just a handful of characters and a vague sense of the world and the humour. My pitch was one of several that got selected for further development… Then, over the next several months, I fleshed out the series idea through a few rounds of pitching until Lloyd was one of a couple of projects that then moved into a fuller development process.

Over the next few years, I worked on Lloyd on and off between other projects – often just me, but we brought in other people to help out at various stages. We wrote scripts and did some design work and animation tests and pitched to broadcasters.

What elements were there early on?
MW: Well… Because it was for Aardman, it was really important that it was strong in comedy, story, and character. While the core characters and tone didn’t change much, the world and look of the series changed a lot during development. For example, it was going to be a 2D series for a long time and then we did a final now-or-never push in 2020 to try and get a greenlight and that’s when we changed to the CG/2D hybrid style and did some new scripts and design work that really helped establish what the series would be.

Fascinating. What’s your background, Matthew? How have you come to be doing this?
MW: When I was a kid, I knew I wanted to either make comics or make films. I then realised that animation was sort of both, so I did that! I studied animation at university, and my graduation film called Astronauts did well at festivals. That led to work at a small company called Arthur Cox in Bristol and then – eventually – Aardman. I was represented as a commercial’s director at Aardman for a long time but also did a lot of animating, writing, and storyboarding across various projects. My first proper series work was as an episode director on Series 6 of Shaun the Sheep before making Lloyd of the Flies.

Amazing. So, Laura… When Aardman’s developing a property like Lloyd of the Flies, what does a Senior Brand Manager look for? What are you doing while Matthew’s summoning the muse?
LB: We need to get under the skin of the show, understand the values, look for what makes it unique and will help it stand out in a very crowded market. One thing that is really unusual about Aardman is that we have direct access to our creatives. Lloyd of the Flies is such a creator-driven project and while we were still in production, we had an immersion session where the wider team got to hear directly from Matt about his vision for the show.

I hadn’t really thought about that… I guess that would be unusual.
LB: Yes, and it was truly inspiring – and immediately sparked so many ideas for marketing, licensing, live events, digital content, promotional partnerships… One of the things that came directly from this immersion session was a Fact or Fiction miniseries which answers questions raised by watching Lloyd of the Flies. Like ‘Do maggots sleep?’ which was inspired by an episode where Lloyd must babysit his 224 maggot siblings. The series is hosted by zoologist and presenter Yussef Rafik and will launch on Lloyd’s YouTube channel in the spring.

Ha! Well, you can’t just put that out there and not tell me the answer! DO maggots sleep?
LB: Ha! They do, but not very much.

Thank you. I’m the same way myself! So, let me ask you about the earliest stages of a project… When you’re developing the ideas, to what extent do each of you have an eye on building the brand beyond broadcast? How soon do you have to start thinking about whether an idea is more than just hugely entertaining?
LB: Before a show is even greenlit, we’re thinking about how we can build a brand that can engage with fans across multiple touchpoints. The media landscape is constantly changing, and we need to be where our audience is. We need to consider that some fans may not discover our characters by watching episodes on TV but may meet them for the first time on social media, in Roblox, or at an event. This is where a thorough understanding of the brand’s DNA is essential to ensure the brand values are reflected across all activations, while allowing enough flexibility to be relevant and appropriate for the different platforms.

Lloyd of the Flies has all the hallmarks of an Aardman production – it’s a high-quality series, with strong comedy values and cross-generational appeal… But it has a unique tone of voice, and the insect theme has given us a brilliant angle for ancillary activities.

MW: It’s not something I thought about much beyond creating the overall look of the series and logo. My original instinct was to make everything really grotty and grim, but I was also aware that colourful and appealing would be an easier sell. I would occasionally wonder whether there would ever be Lloyd merchandise and what it might be like, but not in any depth and it didn’t influence the development of the series beyond making sure it looked nice.

Well, that makes me wonder… Perhaps it’s still too soon to talk about your ultimate ambitions for the brand! Without saying too much, where might you want to take the brand, though?
LB: Our ambition is to follow in the footsteps of Aardman’s biggest global brand, Shaun the Sheep. Shaun the Sheep broadcasts in over 170 territories and has a strong ancillary licensing business around the world. But this is a long game, and we’re in phase one which is all about discovering our audience and reaching as many eyeballs as possible. We need to be where our audience is.

Got it.
LB: We’ve also just released a new spin-off series called Adventures of ArachnoFly which we developed especially to reach our core audience outside traditional broadcast on platforms including YouTube. We launched on our new YouTube hub channel, Sean & friends. The response has been brilliant and we’re always signposting from Adventures of Arachnofly to the main series so our audience can enjoy both shows. We’re building our presence on social media and have launched our first ever Roblox experience starring Lloyd called Buggin’ Out! We had a very successful event with the RHS in the summer where we premiered a Lloyd of the Flies A.R. app which we developed in-house. We now have really strong foundations on which to grow the brand.

My word! Phase one sounds busy! And broadly speaking, Laura – in terms of partnerships – with what kind of companies and people do you want to work? What qualities do they have?
LB: It sounds really obvious, but I’m interested in working with companies and organisations that have an interest in insects and biodiversity. We’ve developed a fantastic A.R. trail event package which piloted at the RHS this summer, and we’re planning to roll out in venues around the UK in 2024. It’s an entertaining, interactive and informative family event that shines a light on the wonderful world of insects. I’d love to hear from any organisations or venues that are interested in hosting this event.

Terrific. What’s your background, Laura?
LB: I’ve been a brand manager at Aardman for 12 years, but prior to that I worked at Macmillan Children’s Books where I managed marketing campaigns across the publishing portfolio, including managing The Gruffalo as a publishing brand for over 10 years.

Oh, wow. What a great way to cut your teeth! Alright, one final question for each of you… I say that; it’s a question in two halves! First, what’s the one question I could’ve asked each of you today, but didn’t?
MW: What is your favourite insect?

LB: What is your favourite bug fact that you learnt through Lloyd of the Flies?

And how would you answer those questions?!
MW: I want say woodlouse, but they’re crustaceans… So rice weevil, because they look funny and have a funny name.

LB: Woodlice shed their skin.

MW: And in answer to Laura’s question – that flies move more slowly when they are cold, because it inspired a funny episode.

Oh my days! This is a cavalcade of knowledge! Woodlice shed their skin, and they’re not insects, they’re crustaceans? Mind… Blown! Thanks for joining me!