Rachel Wyatt, brand director at Brands In, on understanding the customer in real time and continuing to work strategically with retailers and licensors.
Now firmly in the ‘golden quarter’, LicensingSource.net asks a selection of licensees how summer was for them, what were some of their successes and what do they see as the highlights and challenges as we enter the final part of the year.
Today: Rachel Wyatt, brand director, Brands In.
“I guess summer was crazy in terms of the weather and that has made buying patterns tricky to follow for both bricks and mortar and online retail – one minute reaching for your jacket and umbrella the next your shorts and t-shirt. We also used summer to launch key Halloween and Christmas ranges and watched as the consumer bought early into these events – yes pumpkins really do sell in August.
The challenges as always are predicting the future – who is watching what? Who is wearing what, what music is being listened to… having our finger on the pulse of the most up to date trends and fashion really helps us optimise our opportunities.
Our print on demand/drop ship business really enables us to understand our consumer in real time. If they want to buy pumpkins in August (who are we to stop them) we can maximise that opportunity quickly – we see and act in real time and that allows us to drive our design and ranging to deliver to our consumers the most on trend ranges they want to buy.
We continue to work strategically with our retailers and licensors to ensure our consumer offering is current and that we tap into all the relevant launches and events.
The ‘golden quarter’ looks strong – despite the writers’ strikes moving some launches around we are optimistic. There are new movies planned to hit from Disney and Warner Brothers, Netflix has some great TV shows launching and, overlaying that with great design treatments on our core licences, the golden quarter looks platinum.”
This feature originally appeared in the autumn 2023 edition of Licensing Source Book. To read the full publication, click on this link.
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