TOTAL LICENSING
The birth of Character
throughout the Netherlands and KLM use of airtime during the ice hockey
Merchandising
Airlines also signed to use the StiCard season in exchange for use of the
as a postcard. name on shirts. Airtime announced
The Netherlands Ice Hockey Associa-
As a result, Wavery’s licensing busi- matches and rewarded one HIJS
tion had been appointed to organise
ness was born! sponsor at a time with a short com-
the Ice Hockey World Cup. Hans van
Shortly afterwards, the company ac- mercial.
der Heijden, chairman of HIJS Hokji
quired merchandising rights for prop- The idea was an inspired success and
which was a leading club based in The
erties from publishers Dupuis. At new sponsors clamoured for airtime
Hague, was one of the World Cup
the time, these included The Smurfs, on Veronica. It also led Wavery into
organisers and charged Cyril with
Robbedoes, Marsupilami, Guust Flater the world of music merchandise. CBS
the job of finding sponsorship. At the
and Bollie & Bollie and Cyril launched contracted for T-shirts, stickers and
licensing campaigns badges for their stars including Blood,
for each of these Sweat & Tears, Redbone, Dr Hook &
in the Netherlands. the Medicine Show and Colin Blun-
Dupuis was followed stone. The music world was moving
by Lombard who ap- increasingly into merchandise and
pointed Cyril to han- Wavery organised the Veronica CBS
dle Kuifje and, at this Pop Festival in Club Veronica on the
point, Cyril looked Pier.
further afield and Live music and theatrical licensing was
signed a number of now a short step away. Lou van Rees
international rights was involved in promoting stars such
including Spiderman, as Andy Williams whilst Wavery took
the Hulk and the over the merchandising involvement
Fantastic Four from of some of the live concerts and the-
Marvel Comics. atrical events – a side of the business
Oberon, who had that continues today as can be seen
been involved in by the merchandising program for
Cyril’s first licens- Annie, the show brought to Holland
ing deal over Pop- by theatrical producer Henk van der
eye, were part of the VNU publishing Meijden in 2002.
time, Cyril was working with insur-
group and wanted to outsource their Wavery persuaded Lou van Rees
ance company Nationale Nederland-
merchandising activities and signed to bring the London cast of Hair
ed (NN) on a game and on a number
Cyril to represent them. Oberon to Scheveningen to perform over a
of T-shirt campaigns. Seeing the poten-
brought a number of popular char- weekend and, in what little spare time
tial of the link, Cyril persuaded NN to
acters to Wavery including Suske & he had, Cyril produced the music pa-
sponsor the Ice Hockey World Cup.
Wiske (pictured) and Lucky Luke. per Kukeleku for entrepreneur Kees
NN were impressed by Cyril, to the
Of course, not everything was an im- Manders, the husband of popular
point where they asked him to help
mediate success. Cyril realised the Dutch singer Rika Jansen.
them with a further project. NN was
power of merchandising but also the Cyril’s relationship with the Veronica
launching a new insurance policy for
limitations that the Dutch market- radio station continued for many
boats and wanted to use Popeye the
place, very much still in its infancy, years although not always as smooth-
Sailor Man to promote the new prod-
could offer. As a result, he began to ly as he would have liked. Veronica
uct at the Hiswa Boat Show. But NN
look further afield, in particular to- wanted to move onshore and applied
had no idea of how to go about this
wards the US.
and whether they would need a li-
Ice Hockey had become enormously
cense or have to pay royalties.
successful commercially in the Unit-
Cyril saw the opportunity and, with
ed States and Cyril believed that the
the help of Rob Harren and Jan de
same could be possible in the Neth-
Bree of Oberon publishers, he signed
erlands. He went back to HIJS Hokji
Popeye for NN, realising that the op-
who had no commercial sponsor at
portunities presented by this ‘charac-
the time and tried to bring them to-
ter merchandising’ were immense. His
gether with popular pirate radio sta-
belief was confirmed when he regis-
tion, Veronica. However, here he hit a
terd the StiCard, a form of sticker that
stumbling block. Veronica’s Rob Out
could be used as promotional stickers
told Wavery that he ‘didn’t do’ spon-
or entrance tickets. He persuaded
sorship.
Burgers Zoo to use the StiCard to
Cyril had another idea involving the
display their logo on car windscreens
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