Looking down the barrel of the economic crisis and facing dwindling slots for kids programming, UK-based children’s programming distributor Contender Entertainment Group is focusing its sales strategy on a small catalogue of carefully selected programming, writes Emily Brookes.
Peppa Pig distributor Contender Entertainment Group has a strategy firmly in place to deal with what already looks set to be a tough 2009. “We like to take a boutique approach to our distribution,” explains head of international sales and coproduction, Muriel Thomas (left).
The company’s C21screenings suite gives buyers the opportunity to view clips from some of Contender’s most established and best-selling titles alongside new programmes and projects in development.
“Our key show continues to be Peppa Pig, for which we are still producing new episodes and it’s still doing very well internationally,” Thomas says.
Produced by Bafta-winning animators Neville Astley and Mark Baker through their production company Astley Baker Davies (ABD), Peppa Pig is a preschool show about the eponymous animal and her family. The series was originally commissioned for Five and Nick Jr in the UK and has since sold around the world to territories including Australia, New Zealand, France, Korea, Canada, the US and several Scandinavian countries.
Thomas believes that Peppa Pig will continue to be popular, as she feels that it fits into a new trend. “I think the real focus will be on programmes with some kind of positive message, and possibly a bit of magic,” Thomas predicts. “We like to believe that most of our programmes are good quality, with good quality animation, and Peppa Pig remains as successful as it has been, with new stories and episodes keeping the same type of story, which appeals to parents. This type of programming should remain quite high on buyers’ lists.”
Bolstered by good sales for Peppa Pig, Contender has teamed up with ABD again for a new preschool series available to view as a promo at C21screenings. Ben & Holly’s Little Kingdom (left), which stars a fairy named Holly and her best friend, an elf named Ben, was, like Peppa Pig, commissioned by the UK’s Nick Jr after debuting at Cartoon Forum. It has also been acquired by Nickelodeon Latin America, where it will begin its run shortly.
Nick Jr has also commissioned a second Contender preschool series currently in production, Humf, which the company is likewise advertising to the acquisitions community with a promo at C21screenings. That show, which features a little purple monster who learns a new lesson about the world around him in each episode, is a coproduction with King Rollo Films.
“They are all financed, still in production and we are getting episodes pretty much as we speak,” Thomas says of the two new properties, adding that Australia’s ABC has begun airing the first episodes of Humf.
While their production pedigrees and the continuing demand for quality preschool programming gives Little Kingdom and Humf a good chance of success, Contender is also using its relatively strong position to experiment with other types of programming. An example is Lost & Found, an animated half-hour special.
“It’s been produced by AKA Studio, which is a studio more specialised in advertising; it does Deloitte’s adverts,” Thomas explains.
She acknowledges that to pour money into one-off kids’ specials is something of a risk for distributors. “It’s not always a priority for broadcasters; they are more often looking for series,” Thomas admits. But then, demand does arise and, she points out, for those buyers who are looking for them: “It’s hard to find beautiful specials coming to the market.”
In the case of Lost & Found, Thomas says, Contender decided to progress with it at first because it came with a built-in fan base, having been based on a popular book by Oliver Jeffries. “We all fell in love with the book, which was beautifully done, and we did find this studio that is extremely talented,” she explains. “We have produced a 30-second trailer showing a bit of the animation and there is already quite a lot of enthusiasm from international broadcasters.”
The show, a tale of friendship between a boy and a penguin, was completed for Christmas transmission on Channel 4 in the UK, and Contender has also closed sales for the property with Sweden’s SVT, NRK in Norway and DR in Denmark, Thomas reports.
With a mix of these and other new shows, like It’s a Big Big World, alongside top-selling library titles like Bzots and Tractor Tom, Thomas is hoping that Contender’s C21screenings suite will help to introduce its existing buyers to new projects and expand its client base. “Unfortunately we can’t attend all of the markets available, so there is a kind of natural selection that needs to be made,” she says. “C21screenings helps us to have a presence and be seen.”
To view the Contender suite at C21screenings.net, click here.
