Louise Simmonds talks retail relationships, style guides and the potential of the wellbeing sector

Louise, it’s great to chat. Firstly, can you give us a brief summary of your licensing career to date?
I discovered this wonderful industry while I was an intern at Tigerprint Ltd, the supplier to M&S on their stationery and greetings. The buyer asked me to go and find the right licenses for them and so the door was opened. From there I worked at Link Licensing and Entertainment Rights for five years in various category roles focusing on the relaunch of Postman Pat and Basil Brush, and working with Tiger Aspect for Mr Bean, Swizzles Matlow for Love Hearts and Scholastic for Clifford the Big Red Dog.

I then had the opportunity to join the studio world with 20th Century Fox, and I was there for 15 years. I joined in a UK category role and left overseeing their UK & EMEA business which was both a direct and multi-agent model. Their film and TV brands were mainly targeting teens and adults, so a very different licensing experience. I worked across brands like The Simpsons, Family Guy and the fandom fuelled TV show Glee, as well as their iconic films such as Romeo & Juliette, Die Hard, Home Alone and Titanic. I also worked across franchises including Aliens, Avatar and Ice Age. Fox was also the agent for Diary of a Wimpy Kid and Garfield.

Then my most recent role took me back full circle to the infant and pre-school space where I was managing the UK territory for Acamar Films and their brand Bing, with a particular focus on the toy category. It reminded me of how competitive the infant and pre-school space still is.

You have been in the industry for over 25 years. Can you highlight a few of the noteworthy changes you have seen in the licensing sector in this time?
If I think back to when I first started, those significant yearly retail moments were mainly driven by the movie studios – the typical bronze, silver and gold packages – and often by three pre-school brands with dominant TV shows on the BBC or ITV. Now there is a richer variety of IP – like the rise of influencers, toy companies licensing out and creating their own movies, to the heritage and museum sector and much more. Great for the industry yet challenging to get the cut through and maintain loyalty.

“Wellbeing is an area that has more potential with the right brands and partnerships.”

Related to this point is the evolution of how consumers are discovering and creating these licensing opportunities… YouTube over terrestrial TV, Tik Tok and the community gaming worlds are contributing to this richer variety of IP.

The growing importance sustainability now has on the consumer decision making process is a significant change. The licensing sector has taken proactive steps to help support the circular economy and what Products of Change are doing to help educate and be a thought leader is of incredible value to the industry and all the stakeholders.

You’ve mentioned working on a number of successful brands. Are there any common themes that help contribute to licensing success?
Knowing your ‘why’ and how you are relevant to your audience. From there you can set the licensing strategy and roadmap for the licensee and retailer. How will the consumer be seeing, feeling or connecting with that brand in 12 to 18-months’ time? That is often the retail buying cycle you are likely to be working to… Although the planning piece can often not be as clear cut as you would like!

Part of the success is keeping front of mind and maintaining conversations with your consumer. Be in all the right places your audience hangs out, whether this be in-store, in their social and their digital spaces, to where they go in their leisure time…

On the creative side of things, it’s about keeping assets fresh, pushing for innovation and offering newness to fuel conversation and a reason to buy. A brand needs to offer the right assets to inspire partners.

Focusing on design, for a moment what do you think are the essentials that make a good style guide?
What is essential is that the guide needs to visualise and be consistent with the brand’s DNA, so that whenever and wherever your consumers see your product they recognise and relate to your brand. The guide is there to support the licensing strategy. It is there to bring out the best in your partners and why they are the experts in what they do. It needs to inspire and create the desire from your partners to invest in product development.

It does have to be modular in structure, especially as a brand could stretch across multiple product categories, seasonal and cultural events, demographics and retailer tiers. The guide needs to be a springboard to inspire bespoke projects. When developing guides, it’s good to know if there is scope to go deeper with the assets if needed… Or you just need to manage expectations from the outset.

And what I love about guides is they are an added sales resource. It’s key to include product inspiration especially when trying to attract new business. A one-pager explaining the origin of creative stories and their relevance to the brand is useful for partner and retail meetings.

Retail-wise which retailer would you highlight as one that is doing a good job of selling licensed products at the moment?
A relatively new one in recent years is MINISO. It’s a fun store with a clear aesthetic and so knows the brands they need to have. They are now opening MINISO-GO formats in transport hubs… So more to come from them.

Primark for me is still a constant leader. I feel they were one of the first to truly embrace instore activations to keep consumers in their stores longer, encourage sharing and return visits. They have done some amazing licensed ‘shop in shop’ and pop-up experiences. They also coordinate creative collections so well across multiple product categories.

How would you advise an IP owner to build an effective relationship with a retailer?
It’s really an ongoing and two-way communication whereby you get to understand and appreciate what business goals matter most to them – and how your IP can support them towards those. I feel this is at the heart of an effective relationship.

It’s important to experience and understand their customer shopping journey and have data on their performance so you can get a sense of what is happening in their world and their competitors. It is important you do your homework on your own brand too, so you can benchmark where your sales sit for them if they are already buying your brand.

As part of being open it is important to share the brand and licensing plans for the short, medium and long term so they can appreciate the consumer demand that will be building and still be there by the time the product hits their store. The suppliers are integral to supporting an effective retail relationship, so bringing them into the meetings and/or sharing and updating them in a timely manner is key. It’s important everyone is onboard with what you are all trying to achieve.

It does come down to openness, achievable goals and managing expectations from the outset.

You have worked on globally recognised brands like The Simpsons and Bing – is it possible to have one licensing strategy for all territories? How do you make a brand work globally?
This is quite a complex one to answer as it could depend on some pre-requisites… For example, does your brand need to be airing on a certain platform to drive exposure? Or what stage is the brand’s lifecycle in the market?

To make a strategy work, you first need to know if your brand is relatable, has traction and to which audience across the territories. Once you have your core consumer, you can build how you apply and adapt the strategy – there may not be a ‘one size fits all’ it could be clustered and regional.

Territories could respond and lean into the brand with different degrees of intensity across categories, consumer demographics and retail tiers. For example, retail loyalty programmes are more important and valued in some markets than others, different nuances in legislation can affect what products you can enter, cultural events are different and may not even be celebrated at the same time in some markets… They may not all launch at the same time, so timing and category roll out can alter.

On a brand level, you may also find a particular character or art style connects more in some markets, which affects the assets used and type of product you are doing. These differences can complicate things, especially when working with pan EMEA and global retailers. You will have an umbrella objective, yet the strategy may need to adapt.

Thinking about 2025 and 2026, which product category do you think holds the best potential for licensing that is currently being overlooked by the market?
Oh, now that is a tricky one… I wish I could answer that with total confidence. Having said that, wellbeing is an area that, while I do not feel is being overlooked, has more potential with the right brands and partnerships. I see the growth of Holland & Barratt stores, and the apps, podcasts and products that are out there to help us all get a good night’s sleep.

Finally, a fantasy licensing question for you. Come BLE 2025, you have opened your own agency and have a stand at BLE. What three brands would you like to be showing on your stand and why have you selected them?
Jellycat. Their ‘shop in shop’ experience was super cute and there is real loyalty and fandom there. Then I’d say Guess How Much I Love You. This book is gorgeous, universal and timeless. Having seen the beautiful apparel ranges, the look and feel of this brand is perfect for the nursery and the infant market. Finally, the Harry Potter franchise because I am a total fan and have been since the first book was released. The richness of the world offers so much to dive into, coupled with the multi generation audience, and obviously the new TV show coming… Everyone can tap into this brand in some way.

Good picks! Thanks again.