Warner Bros Discovery’s Johanne Broadfield on storytelling, Superman and shared visions

Jo, it’s great to catch up! To kick us off, what is your role at Warner Bros. Discovery?
Group Vice President of Warner Bros. Discovery Global Consumer Products, Europe, Middle East and Africa, Regional Franchise Management and Marketing, and Regional Category Management.

That’s all we have time for I’m afraid Jo…
Yes, it’s a mouthful!

Ha! And how long have you been with Warner Bros., in its different guises?
I joined Turner back in 2014.

So we’ve just had 10 year anniversary!
No one sent me a watch or a free holiday!

We’ll mention it here and you’ll be awash with flowers and all sorts.
Ha! I might!

It’s an impressive stretch of time. What is it about the company that’s kept you there?
When I first started, the company was still TimeWarner. Over time, it evolved into WarnerMedia, and now it’s Warner Bros. Discovery. It’s been incredible to be part of the company’s tremendous evolution through these transitions. There’s never a status quo. and there’s never a dull moment. On top of that, I’m obviously incredibly lucky to work on the amazing brands that sit within the company’s portfolio… DC, Harry Potter, Game of Thrones, Lord of the Rings. I mean, these are juggernaut brands, so you’re never bored. It’s an amazing privilege.

Can you talk us through your role and what it covers?
I’m leading a very talented team of people across a broad scope of activity. In terms of the marketing element – in a nutshell, the Franchise group supports and oversees the marketing activity of all our partners, whether they’re licensees or retail partners across the Europe, Middle East and Africa region. We ensure that they have the best possible marketing and retail assets to work with, and that marketing campaigns executed in this region by our licensees are cohesive and compliant with the brand and franchise guidelines.

This group also works very closely with our Global Consumer Product Franchise colleagues in Los Angeles, supporting them with the development of global strategies and plans for the next two to three years. We’re about to kick off 2027 planning.

Terrific. And when it comes to Category management?
Our Regional Category team is tasked with delivering and executing Category strategies that drive regional revenue growth. They manage global and regional licensee relationships with significant commercial impact across our region and provide strategic and operational support to our Category teams and Agents in the markets.

“Creativity and storytelling is at the heart of what we do.”

Very cool and very busy! And how do you approach brand extension? What guides where you take IP like Superman and Harry Potter?
Creativity and storytelling is at the heart of what we do. At Warner Bros. Discovery, we have some amazing leading, visionary, creative talent behind content that is captivating audiences and driving our business. Look at who’s writing the content, directing the content, producing the content… Whether it’s James Gunn and Peter Safran leading DC Studios, or what Matt Reeves has achieved with The Batman and is sure to achieve with its upcoming sequel, currently scheduled to arrive in 2027. Or David Heyman with the Harry Potter movies, Peter Jackson with Lord of the Rings…

We have amazing creative visionaries – and we have a great responsibility to deliver merchandise programmes that live up to consumer expectations. In order to deliver the best possible outcomes for any of our consumer product programmes, we are obviously guided by our Category knowledge, fan segmentation studies, industry and consumer trends, and retail data and insights – all of these play a role in how we craft and deliver the most appropriate and compelling consumer product programmes for any of our Franchises.

Tim Burton’s Beetlejuice Beetlejuice is a great example. The creative richness of that content – the storytelling, the characters, the sets, the costumes. all provided a fantastic opportunity for highly creative product and marketing innovation.

Absolutely, Beetlejuice Beetlejuice is a great example of that. Is there anything upcoming you’d point to that also showcases that creator-led approach in action?
I’d say DC Studios’ Superman film, written and directed by James Gunn and releasing in July. It’s a massive tentpole for us this year. Superman is one of the world’s most beloved Super Heroes, but what James Gunn is going to deliver will be uniquely James Gunn – and that enables us to play in a completely different way with the Superman franchise when it comes to product extensions.

The new DC Studios co-CEOs, James Gunn and Peter Safran, have been incredibly collaborative with us as a division. We were lucky enough to have a select number of key partners on the set last year. Bringing people in like that is a new era for us.

What do you think is key to successful, creative collaborations between licensors and licensees?
Talent, for sure, on both sides. We are very fortunate to have Heather Laing-Obstbaum – our SVP of Global Creative and Product Development. The assets created by Heather and her team are fundamental to our success. The foundational assets, the style guides, the trend packs, the retail toolkits… Everything that comes out of her team has to be fantastic – and it is. Then you need to have a great roster of expert partners, and you need to spend time with them. Upfront alignment meetings are key.

What launches would you point to of licensees being particularly creative with your brands?
There are so many! We’ve got so many retail channels and shopper profiles that we could talk about… If you’re talking at the very top level, look at what Gucci did with Gremlins – that was mind-blowing. Then there’s what LEGO regularly does with Harry Potter. Their understanding of their consumer and our fan, their creativity and ability to tell stories through product are just amazing.

Another one of my personal favourites is Ruroc – a motorcycle helmet company in the UK that has a DC license with us. They do these amazing motorcycle helmets. They’re beautifully executed and their marketing is extraordinary. They’re terrific storytellers. We love to work with partners to tell the story of the product through marketing in unusual and unexpected ways.

Great examples – and the Gucci x Gremlins collaboration is, on paper, something of a surprising pairing. What do you assess beforehand to make sure these unexpected partners work?
We go through an evaluation process, and we don’t by any means run with everything that’s brought to us. We are proposed a lot of things that we say no to. In the case of Gremlins, Alessandro Michele, Gucci’s then Creative Director, was a huge Gremlin’s fan and we loved the concept he developed.

And as it was a halo partner, they weren’t leveraging standard assets. They went deep into the archive. But as with any launch, we have to make sure that everything that they are developing is in line with the brand’s DNA. And sometimes, that means we even have to check with third party stakeholders as well.
There is also a strategic play for us here, as we are now celebrating Gremlin’s 40 Anniversary and Gucci has triggered a heightened interest in the opportunity with a whole roster of Fashion retailers.

You work on a huge raft of brands. How key is it for you to be a fan of these brands? Does it make a difference to the work?
The first thing to say is that we are data driven. We have a huge amount of insights into consumer groups and demographic profiles that our brands are resonating with. We obviously have a deep understanding of successful product areas, ranges, aesthetics… A lot of the work is grounded in truths and facts.

Then there’s the power of having great licensees and retailers to work with. They’re less emotional about the brands and they bring great perspectives into the discussion. The other thing is that we spend a lot of time in the company making sure we have a very diverse and inclusive employee base. We have people from all sorts of backgrounds working with us. We’ve got a lot of young people as well as people with decades of experience. Bringing that all together avoids groupthink – that’s very important.

Absolutely. Now there might be a perception that it’s tougher to be creatively driven at a big corporation – but it’s clear that it’s at the heart of how you approach things. How do you maintain that approach within a big corporation?
It’s an interesting question. Warner Bros. Discovery’s success is based on telling great stories. That’s what we do. We engage and work with the best talent in the industry to tell the best stories and execute them to world class standards. That storytelling ethos runs through the entire company, including how we take those stories and tell them through products and experiences. It’s also how we approach pitch opportunities – we have to tell a story.

The other thing is that, in my experience, true creativity is rewarded here. If someone comes up with a great idea that’s based on a great insight, we will support them in developing that. Sometimes they fail and sometimes they succeed, but that’s engrained into our creative culture.

What helps you stay creative?
I’m an avid listener of podcasts and audio books. I read a lot of fiction. I listen to a lot of factual podcasts. I’m always listening to something. That’s how I switch off and I find it very stimulating because there’s a lot of amazing literature out there. I find listening to podcasts about topics I know very little about is incredibly stimulating because you’re kind of constantly connecting the dots.

And walking my dog is incredibly stimulating. Just stopping everything and spending an hour in nature is incredibly helpful in freeing your mind and shaking things up in your head. I also try to challenge myself with an adventure holiday where I can immerse myself in something completely unfamiliar.

“In my experience, true creativity is rewarded here.”

Looking ahead, what launches are you excited about?
There’s season three of the HBO Original Series The White Lotus. We’re all very excited about what Mike White is going to be doing with that and we have lots of some great consumer products activity around it – so watch out for that!

And we also very excited about our horror portfolio. I’m a big Stephen King fan and we’ve got It: Welcome to Derry coming. That’s very exciting. Then there’s Superman, along with Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow, which is currently in production and releasing 2026 in theatres – and the new Harry Potter TV series that’s in development. It’s all very cool and we’ve got a lot planned.

To wrap up, is there a brand in the portfolio that you feel is still relatively untapped when it comes to consumer products?
I’m really excited about Lord of the Rings. We have a growing business on the brand at the moment. LEGO has done an incredible job with very few products – they’re executed incredibly well and marketed superbly. We’ve got other companies that are realising there’s an incredible fandom for Lord of the Rings and we’ve got a movie coming up within the next couple of years. I think there’s far more to unlock around the brand. It’s a global fandom and there’s more to come on Lord of the Rings.

The other one is Superman. In IP terms, it hasn’t really been unlocked to anywhere near its true potential. The way that James Gunn bringing out these other locations and other characters that haven’t been interpreted for the big screen yet… That’s going to unlock a whole universe for us.

Jo – a huge thanks again! Let’s tie-in again soon