Consultancy will work on family games and digital entertainment strategy for Prisoners of Geography series.
BlueSkye Licensing – headed up by Maggy Harris – has teamed up with independent publisher Elliott & Thompson to map out a family games and digital entertainment strategy for the best selling Prisoners of Geography books.
The titles – written by Tim Marshall – have enjoyed healthy global sales growth since the original hardback was first published in 2015. Now, the publisher believes that extending the franchise through a family-centric, highly targeted digital and game-based licensing programme is ‘a natural step forward’.
“This franchise is a great example of licensing opportunities coming from an ever increasing and broad range of sources,” explained Maggy. “Prisoners of Geography fits perfectly into the huge demand for quality, factual, fun family and digital entertainment which the 2020 lockdown world has accelerated.
“Tim’s books provide fresh, timeless content for our changing times.”
First published in 2015, with a children’s illustrated edition following in 2019 – which was shortlisted by Waterstones for its Book of the Year – a sequel, The Power of Geography, is planned for 2021.
With 1.5 million copies sold to date in 30 languages, global retail sales now exceed $20 million for Prisoners of Geography, with the book combining geography, history and politics in an informative, accessible way.
The target audience from a licensing perspective is family edutainment with board, strategy, quiz, puzzle games and digital quiz apps, plus experiential, gifts, stationery, posters and cards being the initial main merchandise focuses.
Creatively, licensees will be able to access multiple design assets source from the illustrated edition.
Lorne Forsyth, chairman of Elliott and Thompson, commented: “This is a timely and welcome business development opportunity. We are a growing publishing house at the heart of the creative independent publishing sector.
“We look forward to working with Maggy, our licensed partners and Tim to build a uniquely different, but successful, multimedia franchise.”
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