Now that we’ve all got our Bob the Builder lunch boxes stuffed with Bob’s licensed fruit snacks, die-cast play tools, and special-edition Playdoh, it may come as no surprise that this beloved British handyman is now broadcast in 140 countries. Or that Sears has set up Bob boutiques in 850 stores across the US. Or that in Britain Bob’s thumbs-up theme song, “Can We Fix It? Yes, We Can,” became the nation’s hottest tune since “Candle in the Wind.” Indeed, in a little over a year, 8.5 million Bob the Builder books have gone home to kids’ toolboxes everywhere, says Linda Dowdy, General Manager of Publishing for the Americas at Hit Entertainment, the production juggernaut behind the hard-hatted heart-throb.
The undeniable success of children’s television properties such as Bob and dinosaur-adversary Barney tends to overshadow an important distinction between not-for-profit, subsidized public television properties and the equally successful and as highly praised shows produced by the very commercial Nickelodeon network. In a word, it’s money. “We have no trouble competing as far as entertainment value,” says Christopher Cerf, President of Sirius Thinking and Creative Producer of Between the Lions, the critically acclaimed program about reading that will première its third PBS season on September 16. “But we’re constantly underpublicized. It’s hard to get the promotional dollars behind a show like ours to compete with some of the big studios.” Sirius Thinking’s dilemma is one faced by all children’s programming that appears on the non-commercial PBS instead of commercial networks. Acknowledged or not, the pressure to earn income from licensing looms at the outset, and may influence actions taken by the licensors, including rushing to market before the audience has a chance to build.
Positioned as the next step after Sesame Street and aimed at kids aged 4 to 7, Between the Lions chronicles a leonine family as they delve into the world of books and teach reading skills with a mix of puppetry, animation, and live action. There’s also a heady dose of celebrity appearances (Larry King, Melissa Etheridge, and Sigourney Weaver all pop in for a visit this season), but the focus is on curriculum-based reading instruction. “The important thing about our show is that it has a scientific, research-based reading curriculum,” Cerf explains. “We try to teach reading systematically in the course of entertainment. We think that will be the key to our licensing as we go forward. As parents realize that this is a project that can help their kids to read, we expect they’ll be very loyal to it.”
Betsy Groban, Managing Director of WGBH Enterprises (WGBH co-produces the series with Sirius Thinking), says that Golden Books has the show’s book license, but following Random’s takeover of Golden, “Between the Lions got lost in the shuffle. We would love to form an alliance with another trade publisher.” Others familiar with the situation point out that the Lions’ educational bent didn’t work with Golden’s mass-merch focus. And even more than most books, licensed products have to find their niche quickly or be dropped. “From a sales and marketing perspective,” adds Golden’s Associate Publisher, Amy Jarashow, “we launched a relatively large program for a show which had little consumer awareness upon the books’ initial publication.” Moving forward, a textbook line is under way with Pearson Education, which is developing a “Knowledge Box” that lets teachers call up any part of the show in class. Interest has been so strong that “we’re using the school popularity to work back into the consumer market,” Cerf says. All in all, 5.5 million viewers watch the program each week, 31% of them adults.
Of course, there are other worthy shows out there in the world of public broadcasting. Karen Gruenberg, Executive VP of Content and Operations for the nonprofit Sesame Workshop, which has publishing arrangements with Random House and Reader’s Digest, among others, reports that the group is launching a book program with Scholastic for its newest PBS series, Sagwa — “The Chinese Siamese Cat” — based on a children’s title originally written by Amy Tan and illustrated by Gretchen Schields. The project will launch with two storybooks this fall, and four titles are set for the spring, according to Sesame Publishing Director Valerie Garfield. The group’s Dragon Tales property is launching a book series with Random, and there’s Sesame Street, of course. Titles are all vetted by Sesame’s panel of researchers (who recently gathered kids’ post-Sept. 11 responses via journals, videos, and scrap books). “It’s a much different take on licensed publishing,” says Garfield.
The Big Consumer Splash
Not that publishers are complaining about Bob and company. Simon & Schuster has sold 4.2 million Bob the Builder books, plus a million copies of SpongeBob Squarepants titles, according to Tracy van Straaten, Director of Publicity for S&S Children’s Publishing. When it comes to TV properties, all those book sales — along with the branded foam furniture and the packaged underwear — are the lifeblood of a franchise, as the actual broadcast does not necessarily generate much in the way of revenue, although it does offer crucial exposure. “Broadcast supports the brand that drives the business,” explains Denise Perkins-Landry, spokeswoman for Hit Entertainment, which acquired Barney with last year’s purchase of Lyrick Studios. “There are very few preschool properties that survive without broadcast.” But without the advertising income and vast exposure that benefits commercial properties, public-television productions exist only as long as the producers can afford to tape the next season, which is often financed by grants or underwriting. For example, Between the Lions is supported in part by the US Department of Education, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, and Cheerios.
To help make that all-important consumer splash, Cerf says that a licensing partner’s promotional plans can carry just as much weight as the up-front money (all of which, the producers stress, goes right back into the show’s production). And take note: a Spanish-language version of Between the Lions is on tap, in addition to a show using roots music to help preschoolers become more musical, plus a new science series. Such reader-friendly fare may never conquer Bob and Barney. But you never know. Between the Lions was the first TV show in a decade to win an endorsement from the National Education Association, and one study conducted in Kansas found that kids who watched the program performed better on almost all outcome measures of reading achievement. “In the long run,” Cerf says, “it’s a better business than a hit-driven business. The real issue is building a brand that stands for reading.”
