Food Makers Cashing In by Turning Brands Into Books, Toys
At first glance, the Sun-Maid Raisins Play Book could be mistaken for a box-top giveaway, with the Kingsburg, Calif., raisin giant’s trademark splashed across the front and a coupon for its products pasted in back.
But it’s no freebie. The $6 book, which hit toy stores late last year, is an example of how children’s book publishers, toy companies and pint-sized apparel makers are making a renewed push to harness the marketing power of parents’ favorite childhood food brands.
In addition to the book, Sun-Maid and the Alexander Doll Co. debuted a doll modeled on the raisin company’s trademarked bonnet-clad lass at the Toy Fair in New York last month. And following the success of its children’s books last year, cereal maker General Mills unveiled several new Cheerios toys and puzzles, including a Cheerios truck and a plastic cellular phone that dispenses cereal with a touch of the send button.
“Brand and corporate trademark licensing is the fastest-growing part of the consumer products licensing business,” growing 6% last year to $17.9 billion in retail sales, or about a quarter of the entire licensing business, said Marty Brochstein, executive editor of the Licensing Letter. “Companies are looking into their vaults and saying, ‘What do we own and how can we leverage these brands?’ ”
And they’re looking beyond the more obvious licensing opportunities, such as logo-festooned T-shirts and instead developing promotional vehicles that get kids more engaged with their products.
Candy marketer Mars Inc. was the first to introduce an educational book several years ago that used its M&M; candies to teach counting and basic shapes. In the last year, a handful of new books has hit the market, including the Pepperidge Farm Goldfish Fun Book and the two Cheerios play books. Another cookie book from Nabisco is set to hit toy stores this fall.
Licensing deals such as these aren’t likely to become a major source of revenue for most food companies, analysts say. But they cost the firms nothing and encourage parents to buy the snacks more often. And perhaps more important, company officials say, they get kids associating their products with fun.
“We get a lot of young consumers having experiences with Sun-Maid raisins at a very young age,” said Rick Bruno, Sun-Maid’s vice president of licensing.
Food companies are paid a fee for the use of their trademark, typically based on a percentage of sales. In exchange for this modest sum, publishers and toy companies get attention-getting packaging that helps them differentiate their product from a sea of similar products.
The two Cheerios play books, for instance, have sold more than 1 million copies since their introduction last year, an astounding figure, says their publisher, considering that similar books typically sell about 25,000 copies.
“With thousands of children’s books on the shelves, you have to have something that’s going to literally jump off the shelves,” said Robin Corey, publisher of novelty and media tie-in books for Simon & Schuster. “Recognizable packaging like this can’t miss.”
In a recent brainstorming meeting at Simon & Schuster, Corey said, hundreds of ideas for children’s books were pitched. Of the 15 that emerged as finalists, almost a third were food-related, she said.
General Mills is even venturing into clothes this year, introducing pajamas and slippers emblazoned with the Honey Nut Cheerios bee at this year’s Magic apparel show in Las Vegas.
“Since 1998 we’ve gone from zero to about $100 million at retail,” said Leigh Ann Schwarzkopf, General Mill’s manager of trademark licensing. However, the popularity of these items depends largely on their novelty. Once consumers stop doing double takes when they see their favorite snack-food brands on bookshelves or clothing racks, sales could fade.
Indeed, said Herb Brown, chairman and chief executive of Alexander Doll, this year his firm discontinued plans for a doll based on the umbrella-toting Morton Salt girl, after they found out a mail order firm had distributed a doll based on that character recently.
“You can’t put too much [brand-related merchandise] into the market at any one time,” Brown said.
Alexander Doll combs chat rooms, collectors shows and other places to find the brands with the most nostalgia appeal for consumers. In addition to the $70 Sun-Maid doll, which is packaged in a red raisin box just like its supermarket counterpart, the company is introducing a Ronald McDonald doll this spring.
But, analysts say, there is a limit to this kind of promotion. At some point, consumers can feel used by a too-transparent sales pitch. After all, many books and toys based on trademarks, like the Pillsbury Dough Boy and the Campbell Soup kids, were obtained for free (with proofs-of-purchase) in years past, toy industry officials say.
Certainly, the plugs within some of the children’s books are less than subtle. One page of the Sun-Maid book--a Children’s Book-of-the-Month Club selection--positions a package of the company’s product next to a decorating activity. Another seems to promote new uses for the product by asking kids, “Why not make this piece of toast tastier by adding some raisins?”
But publishers say once you look past the promotion, these books have about the same content and value as any other children’s book on the market.
“There are people who would say, ‘Blech, that’s just promotion,’ ” Corey says. “But what the book teaches is 100% legitimate.”
