Join the CEO of CMA, Alison Simpson, as she welcomes Jeremy Tucker, the EVP, Global Chief Marketing Officer at Spin Master Ltd. to rediscover the power of play, and the magic that dwells within us all.

00:00:02:11 - 00:00:21:08 Welcome to CMA Connect, Canada's marketing podcast, where industry experts discuss how marketers must manage the tectonic shifts that will change how brands and businesses are built for tomorrow, while also delivering on today's business needs. With your host, CMA CEO, Alison Simpson.

00:00:22:13 - 00:00:45:11 Alison: Today on CMA Connect, we're going to probe into the fascinating world of toys and children's entertainment. We're also going to hear how Spin Master, a Canadian company, has built a thriving global business and brand from a Canadian head office. Our guest today is Jeremy Tucker. Jeremy is Spin Masters EVP and Global Chief Marketing Officer. He joined the company after working on leading global brands, including Disney, Pepsi and Nissan, to name a few.

00:00:46:08 - 00:00:52:12 Alison: Jeremy just celebrated his first anniversary with Spin Master, so, Jeremy, happy anniversary and it's great to have you joining us today. 00:00:52:19 - 00:00:56:14 Jeremy: Thank you, Alison. Thank you so much for having me. I'm really excited to talk today.

00:00:56:15 - 00:01:17:15 Alison: Now, I'm going to start by talking a bit about the global brand that Spin Master has built. A number of Canadian brands have tried to expand beyond our borders and struggled. Your brand has been incredibly successful and now significantly more of your business is from outside Canada than inside. This is a success that our listeners are absolutely keen to learn from.

00:01:18:01 - 00:01:21:06 Alison: So what do you attribute Spin Master's global growth and success to?

00:01:22:08 - 00:01:41:11 Jeremy: Yeah, it's a great legacy, right? And if you think about our humble beginnings, starting with the Earth Buddy, with our founders, it was just a relentless passion of really understanding the magic of play and making these incredible experiences and finding an audience for them. And the great thing that unites the world, of course, is our children, but also how we play.

00:01:41:21 - 00:02:08:11 Jeremy: And that might take different forms and different preferences around the world, but really, really understanding it and getting really close to the consumer, and what makes a kid, or a parent with the kid, excited to play. What that has enabled us to do is to create a footprint all around the world, first with our products, then as we evolved as a company with the brands that we're building, and now the power of all three of what we call our creative centres to bring it to life.

00:02:08:11 - 00:02:33:14 Jeremy: So now we've got products with toys, we've got digital games, and those experiences, which is another form of play. And of course, what ignites imaginations in the experience is our entertainment division. And it was a very systematic build and we followed the consumer and that's enabled us to really deliver this promise of delivering incredible play experiences that reimagine play, which is universal.

00:02:33:20 - 00:02:48:18 Alison: Thanks Jeremy,that's a great, great place to start. Now, I know you have a personal history working in franchise marketing, and it's certainly been key to Spin Master's success and growth. Can you share some of the ways that Spin Master is leveraging franchising so successfully and with such staying power?

00:02:50:08 - 00:03:12:00 Jeremy: Sure. Well, maybe we should start by talking about our crown jewel, Paw Patrol, right? Paw Patrol is an incredible franchise and I've had the ability to work on many children's franchises from some of the biggest that you've mentioned in my background. But I will tell you that I've never seen anything like Paw Patrol and the reason I would say that is the longevity of this franchise.

00:03:12:07 - 00:03:35:16 Jeremy: It's the leading preschool franchise in the world and it's been that way, we celebrated ten years, our ten year anniversary, so ten years strong. And the amazing thing about that is, again, thinking about how Paw Patrol works and operates and what we do to build it and strengthen it with our fans all around the world. Of course, you would say as a toy company it starts with the toys.

00:03:36:00 - 00:04:00:13 Jeremy: That's true. But it really starts with the consumers and it starts with the kids that are our fans, our core 4 to 6 year olds and of course, the parents that buy the product for them and really bringing to life a singular purpose. It's the adventure that all kids see, puppies which they love, but the underlying current is really empowering little kids to do big things.

00:04:01:06 - 00:04:26:17 Jeremy: And then, of course, the secret sauce to what we do in building a franchise is when you've got a strategy like that or you've got a story arc like that, a brand like that, our superpower is bringing story to shelf. Because if you can imagine it and you can play in your mind with what the world of Adventure City is and how Chase and Marshall and Skye all work together to save the day,

00:04:27:07 - 00:04:54:00 Jeremy: how do you now bring the products forward that actually deliver on that and capture the imagination of kids and parents so that they can play and live out those experiences? And that is really the thing that we challenge ourselves on from a franchise perspective, continually looking to where the kids are going around the world, looking at the themes that make them excited, that deliver that empowerment message and create the excitement and action, and have fun because this is about light.

00:04:54:13 - 00:05:13:04 Jeremy: And at the end of the day, that's what keeps us as a company up at night. It's just the relentless fanaticism of really understanding kids and moms all around the world. And as a marketer today, especially in the dynamic world of kids, which changes very quickly, you've got to stay on it. You got to stay close to the consumer.

00:05:13:13 - 00:05:23:18 Jeremy: Completely be fascinated with them and you guide your entire gamut of marketing, all the tools at your disposal, to really make sure you're delivering your message in multiple ways.

00:05:24:07 - 00:05:51:01 Alison: So Jeremy, building on what you shared, so kids can absolutely be fickle. And what's hot today won't be hot next week. Yet you're celebrating your 10th anniversary. So kudos, what a truly remarkable accomplishment. You also have a very unique global perspective on how kids are the same universally, but also if there are any differences. So I'd be curious to hear from your learning on Canadian kids and Canadian parents if you've noticed any differences.

00:05:51:16 - 00:06:15:08 Jeremy: Sure. Well, there's definitely some things that I would say resonate very powerfully with our Canadian audience. So if you look at our first Paw Patrol movie, for example, not the one that's currently in theatres, but the one previous, which really set the bar for what we want to do as an entertainment company. The first opening scene, if you would notice there are the pups saving a truck driver who is carrying maple syrup.

00:06:15:21 - 00:06:43:20 Jeremy: And it was a little nod to our fans because we actually produce all this content, this wonderful, beautiful content here in Canada, out of our Spin Master entertainment studios, led by Jen Dodge. It's a very important part of pride for the company with an incredibly talented studio model that we have. It really bring these stories to life. When we actually market the products, we empower our regional marketing teams to deliver their marketing plans, bespoke whatever market they're at.

00:06:44:15 - 00:07:13:10 Jeremy: It's a very, very important thing. But when you think about a global franchise. So yes, as a franchise leader, we'll set the strategy, We'll talk about the big themes. What are the big bets, working with our toy team, our entertainment team. But when it comes down to execution, we want to empower our local marketers. We have a Canadian market leader, US market leader, all around the globe market leaders, to build their budgets, choose their media mix and update, localize their messaging to be right for their audience.

00:07:14:02 - 00:07:34:06 Jeremy: And that's a very important thing for a global marketing organization. You have to have a global vision - where are we going to the franchise and how are we going to continue to make it grow and be healthy. But you have to open up and be open-handed to allow your experts to really shine in the markets that they live and operate in.

00:07:34:22 - 00:08:00:15 Jeremy: And I think that that's what makes Paw Patrol uniquely feel, you know, it's relevant in our Canadian stores that we have. So, yes, we have big box retailers, the same as the United States, but we also have some retailers here that are very important, they're very unique to Canada. And between our sales force and our local marketing team, we want to make sure that that experience of Paw Patrol really fits that commercial space when the consumer comes in.

00:08:01:06 - 00:08:15:02 Alison: I love that you chose maple syrup as the kiss and thank you to Canadians - very appropriate. Jeremy, when you and I met previously, you mentioned launching a new franchise. So what lessons are you going to take from the phenomenal success of Paw Patrol as you launch Unicorn Academy?

00:08:16:14 - 00:08:36:16 Jeremy: Alison That's a great question. So to answer that, I have to answer in two ways. There's what will we take, the tenets, and what do we have to do differently because the world is so different now than it was ten years ago. So for Unicorn Academy, we're launching us on Netflix and we're investing in it from a company perspective to bring to life new stories

00:08:36:22 - 00:09:06:17 Jeremy: Off of a beloved book series. But we're reimagining it for modern day girls. So core to this, number one, all the way back to when I originally started with, is really understanding the consumer - girls. But what we found as we explored that was there are themes for girls that matter for this generation of girls. Friendship, bonding, having a place, the school dynamics and experience.

00:09:06:17 - 00:09:29:05 Jeremy: All of these things are very, very much top of mind and are played out in the content they consume and what they do and what they talk about. And so you say, okay, how can we bring those insights into the world of storytelling? And then you have to let the storytellers do their job. And what we learned was you've got to create attachment to the characters.

00:09:29:09 - 00:09:58:05 Jeremy: You've got to not only attach to the characters in this particular series, but each character bonds with a unicorn. But girls identify with these different archetypes, and they like that social dynamic in the challenges, and you needed to dial up the stakes a little bit more because we've learned with Paw Patrol, if you look at ten years ago to today, it's gotten a little bit more on the adventure space, making sure that we, you know, kids today want a little bit more oomph.

00:09:58:18 - 00:10:22:04 Jeremy: They get the impact of superhero movies. Think about the impact of media. So it's still very, very much targeted for preschoolers and safe. But the action is dialed up a little bit and the humour is dialed up a little bit to reflect the culture. We applied the same principles to Unicorn Academy. We upped the game on the animation. We upped the game on the music and the visual storytelling and the arcs that go with it.

00:10:22:15 - 00:10:39:23 Jeremy: And we sequenced it in a way that you've got a launch of a movie, and then the series will actually continue to play out. It's a modern approach to engaging the consumer, but again, you've got to stay on it. I think if there's one message with kids, it's whatever we're doing right now may be different from what we're doing six months from now. There'll be a core thread, a play, but we've got to continue to push ourselves to think and act and behave like children, which requires us to play ourselves. Alison: That doesn't sound like a bad job description actually. Jeremy: And yeah, you know, we have a lot of fun around here, so it's great.

00:10:57:17 - 00:11:26:00 Alison: Now you called out some very important themes, and as you were talking about how very different young girls are, those different ages. I know every parent of a young daughter that's listening was smiling and certainly relating. Having gone through the challenge we as a society did over the last three years, did you see any of those themes either soften or become even more important coming out of the isolation of the pandemic?

00:11:26:00 - 00:11:26:11 Jeremy: You know what, the

00:11:26:11 - 00:12:00:14 Jeremy: pandemic actually taught us a few things. If you look at the industry and you look at the styles of the industry, when everybody was hunkered down for COVID, the toy industry started to really have a rebirth. Certain segments really flourished, like boardgames. But toys overall really started to resonate because we're all home together. And I think what it did for parents in particular, and I will even say maybe one step further for dads, we brought us back in,

00:12:00:14 - 00:12:21:17 Jeremy: it brought us back into the world of play. It taught us as adults, the power of play again and how to play. And you know, what's interesting is that co-play, while still not as big as kids playing on their own, right, let's be let's be really honest. Kids playing on their own, they're going to play. But the co-play still had some stick-to-it-iveness.

00:12:22:14 - 00:12:49:12 Jeremy: Parents started to change and modify their behaviour and realize the joy it brought them to interact and play alongside their kids. Parents are worried about social emotional learning. They're worried about their kids interacting with other kids, how they catch back up on their education, how they play and have resilience and grit to get through and kind of move forward and leave, you know, the challenges of COVID

00:12:49:12 - 00:13:13:08 Jeremy: And the post-COVID world behind. They won't articulate that. And it's not maybe expressing itself all the way down in sales right now, but it's a theme that's bubbling, and they're looking for solutions and they're looking for opportunities even when they don't directly express it to help with that. And the great thing about that is, overall, the balm for that is play.

00:13:13:08 - 00:13:42:02 Jeremy: And so it sets us up again in this really unique space to say, let's talk about our role in society, let's talk about what Spin Master brings to the table, and then we will let the consumer opt into our entire portfolio and I think parents are starting to link the power of play with imagination, with problem solving, with grit, you know, with different things, with just hope and optimism, which is one of the things that parents want most for their kids right now.

00:13:42:02 - 00:14:04:12 Jeremy: So it gives me a lot of excitement, a lot of pride about what Spin Master is doing and our impact on the world here from Canada out. Yes, we are a business. Yes, we sell toys and you know, we're for profit. But the reality is we're doing good by really captivating imaginations and bringing people back to play. And we're going to keep doing that.

00:14:04:12 - 00:14:16:19 Jeremy: And we've got more things coming. You've seen some some announcements this week. We got Unicorn Academy, the Paw movie. I mean, the deck is stacked and the team is on it and we're just really, really, really excited about the road ahead.

00:14:17:02 - 00:14:44:11 Alison: That's great. Thank you, Jeremy. Now, any marketer and certainly this would be true of you, are really focused on understanding how the marketing we're doing is going to succeed, tracking and determining what will ultimately be successful and learning along the way. So you've got wonderful examples of great success with your different franchises. Can you share a bit about how you do track and determine what you hope will be successful?

00:14:44:11 - 00:15:02:22 Jeremy: I think, you know, again, I'll give you a frame of reference for this. If you think about my career in the different places I have been, I'm a nontraditional brand marketer that I've gone through many different verticals, whether it's entertainment, CPG, automotive, fitness, and here back to toy, which is the love of my life. For those marketers that are listening,

00:15:02:23 - 00:15:30:10 Jeremy: when you think about traditional consumer packaged goods, CPG, toy is a little different from that. CPG, we are trained on how to manage a business, soup to nuts. Look at the PNL, understand your distribution, your velocity, the key buy, windows, a season out. Fill the blank. You can hear me go down it. You know and you manage a portfolio and a product line and you might have ten SKUs of one set, five SKUs of another flavour, whatever that may be.

00:15:30:17 - 00:15:57:10 Jeremy: But overall, you're managing that on a multi-annual basis with some news and innovation spiking the water. Within Spin Master, especially with our DNA as innovators, we are always bringing news to market and our lines reset every year, every season, so it creates a different dynamic that brings us closer to fashion in a way, retail in a way, than it does in a consumer packaged goods type of way.

00:15:57:10 - 00:16:17:05 Jeremy: So yes, we're applying brand management and franchise management principles to what we're doing, but we've got to stay nimble at that. So, big set up for your very simple question. What that means is that we have to actually be very, very much on the pulse of where the consumer is going, and we do that through the insights that I talked about.

00:16:17:15 - 00:16:35:11 Jeremy: We do that through the expertise of the talented men and women who lead the company, veterans of the toy industry, veterans of the entertainment industry and the digital gains industry. They know this space. They love it, and they have been experts at it for a long time. But they challenge, we challenge ourselves to use current data to get ahead of it.

00:16:36:00 - 00:16:56:17 Jeremy: Then we hunker down. And what I mean by that is - best laid plans. You called it out a little bit earlier in the podcast. We can do the best we can do and have all the data. But when it comes to kids, you just don't now. So you've got to be ready to move as fast as they and Q4 is all about the holidays.

00:16:57:02 - 00:17:20:16 Jeremy: This is it. This is our Super Bowl, this game time, right? And so what we do is we create a warrior across company and we look at every week all of our sales our retail performance, consumer sentiment, marketing performance, the lift that we're getting, how we're driving pull through, what's hot, what's not. And we have to make decisions on how we actually play the portfolio.

00:17:20:16 - 00:17:39:07 Jeremy: And again, being a global company, it's not a one size fits all because there are things that in Europe are working very well right now and things that are here are not working as well. And you have to really localize that going back to the empowerment of our teams, to make the right business decisions in the markets in which we operate.

00:17:39:07 - 00:17:51:04 Jeremy: So very, very complicated high seasonality, you have to be very agile and you have to not be precious because we have to take all those signals into account to make the right decisions.

00:17:51:17 - 00:18:11:11 Alison: So I love that you tell marketers not to be precious and get so caught up in what we thought was going to work. And agility is mission critical, especially as you're in the quarter that will define success in many ways for the year for you. You're also a global organization and with some pretty significant interdependencies with your retail partners and others.

00:18:11:19 - 00:18:16:01 Alison: So I'd love to hear how you're able to be as agile as you're able to be.

00:18:16:08 - 00:18:57:05 Jeremy: The agility for us is Spin Master number one is part of our DNA. I think we are an entrepreneurial company. We have been an entrepreneurial company since founders were here, including the DNA that we have with our CEO and the executive team that's here with me. Number one, that's a mindset. So that helps us be agile. I think number two, it's continuing to challenge ourselves as we continue to grow and expand as a public and global organization on how to play that role, because this is the scale we're at right now, but maintain the agility and the empowerment that we need in the local markets to deliver the business results and driving the accountability there too.

00:18:57:22 - 00:19:19:09 Alison: That's outstanding advice and the clarity of understanding, everyone understanding the mission and the mandate and then being able to delegate that autonomy and accountability to the different teams is such a powerful combination. Now, Jeremy, as you're developing new products, to what degree are you developing a product specifically for a girl or a boy?

00:19:19:19 - 00:19:40:22 Jeremy: So first and foremost, we look for the play experience and we look for the properties or brands that would actually bring that to life. In the past, historically in the industry, it has been very gender split and traditionally it will land on gender lines. But we challenge ourselves to think about play capital P play. That's the first thing that leads us out.

00:19:41:13 - 00:19:53:17 Jeremy: And when we do it that way, it really allows us to focus on the experience and what's best. And does that take on something that skews gender One way or another? The consumer will lead us there and we will follow.

00:19:55:01 - 00:20:15:19 Alison: Now, you mentioned earlier we're in the crucial Q4 holiday sales period. That's certainly crucial for many retailers and absolutely mission critical for the toy industry. We're also facing certainly a more challenging economy. So can you share some of the trends that you're seeing and how spin Masters adopting this year's Q4 approach to make the most of the holiday buying season?

00:20:15:19 - 00:20:48:06 Jeremy: So I think, you know, number one, as I spoke about previously, we are really focused on being together and being super aligned real time on the performance in the market through our processes, in our war rooms and what we do so that we can enable ourselves to work discussions and make quick decision. But when we look at the consumer and how we planned the back half of this year versus previous years coming out of COVID, there was from an industry perspective, a demand that kind of pushed the whole industry out.

00:20:48:23 - 00:21:21:23 Jeremy: There is also not just for toy, but across the world. I've heard about you remember the inventory supply issues and how that kind of all played out. We don't have those factors anymore, right. But also during COVID because of what was happening in the different shutdowns around the world, there wasn't a lot of news across the industry. And the toy category mature is like fashion news drives, sales and what we're very excited about coming into this year and what we planned for is we've got some great innovation that we're bringing to market across all of our line.

00:21:22:19 - 00:21:40:06 Jeremy: We are looking at how we actually refresh the line and bring this news and excitement to the category, right? So we've got that going for us. We've looked at the price point. We want to make sure that we've got good price thinking that we're in line with where the consumer's going as the economy kind of rattles and as consumer confidence around the kind of shakes.

00:21:41:05 - 00:22:07:09 Jeremy: But the other thing that I would say is very interesting to dynamics across categories, with the exception maybe of one beauty, all categories or maybe disposable income in retail right now are a little challenged. That doesn't mean Christmas isn't going to count parents and shoppers or shopping behavior perspective or timing it a little closer to the holidays. We've seen this happen historically in recessions.

00:22:07:09 - 00:22:30:03 Jeremy: We've seen this happen historically over previous years. So what that means for us is we with our retailers, have to create confidence around those key shopping moments. So it creates a very interesting dynamic that's that's unsettling for sure. But something that we can plan for and try to manage as best we can. The last thing I would say, yes, I told you, there are a couple things are all different.

00:22:30:16 - 00:22:56:20 Jeremy: Yes, parents pocketbooks are challenged and they're going to think more carefully and more considered about what their children want. But there's also a secret weapon of the holidays. I've said it. I'll say it again. Grandparents will say Christmas because their relationship grew. COVID coming out of this, and especially this generation of parents, they're closer to their parents and the role of grandparents is taking an interesting turn.

00:22:56:21 - 00:23:41:12 Jeremy: And these consumers, the grandparents, are not impacted from a discretionary income and spend perspective the same as grandparents, and they are more likely to spend on their kids and their grandkids than previous generations and spend more. So if you think about that, it created an interesting opportunity for us that we've never done before at scale, and we have market by market candidate included U.S. all around the world, targeted campaigns not only to parents but also to grandparents around the holidays to make sure that they understand the incredible toys that we offer and encourage them to put one of those or two of those into their basket as they choose their list for the holidays.

00:23:41:12 - 00:23:48:19 Alison: Thanks, Jeremy. That brings a whole new sentiment to Senior Power. And I'll definitely be hugging grandparents, as I'm sure many retailers will this quarter.

00:23:49:12 - 00:23:52:14 Jeremy: Grandparents will say Christmas. It's going to be phenomenal.

00:23:54:03 - 00:24:12:12 Alison: The journey. I had absolutely no doubt that toy marketing was going to be a fascinating conversation. And you shared great advice that's relevant to marketers across many different sectors. So I thank you very much for that. I would love to end by having you share a parting thought or advice that you have for our listeners.

00:24:12:12 - 00:24:34:19 Jeremy: Yeah, I think that some of the best advice I ever received was get yourself as close to the consumer as you possibly and as you continue to grow in your career as a marketer and as an executive, It's very easy to get isolated and get out of touch with the very men and women that you want to create.

00:24:34:19 - 00:25:04:21 Jeremy: Incredible experiences, foreign trips, man lit the brand and get out there and do it. When I was at PepsiCo, although as a cook drinker before I drink Pepsi and I went and understood the retail environment and what was going on there. And yes, I went to the Paw Patrol mirror, not the big corporate premier. I took it, sat in a theater in the back row with me and my chief people officer, and we just watched and listened and laughed and saw what kids laughed at and slapped out and just stayed curious.

00:25:05:10 - 00:25:27:00 Jeremy: So to stay alive as a marketer today, how to get as close to the consumer as Yeah, you got to be passionate about that. And the last thing within that, the undercurrent curiosity, you got to build that yourself. You got to be curious about the why and the 2 to 3 level down wise about why people do what they do.

00:25:27:10 - 00:25:51:23 Jeremy: You know, these types of questions help you understand how to really understand it and really drive the domain. And in the preference of your product is that's what it is, right? You want to build brand. We want to build what we want to build protection from the competition. We want to build demand. We want to drive growth. And if you don't understand the consumer and you're not close to them, just reading the data, what's on the page is not going to get you there.

00:25:52:01 - 00:25:53:00 Jeremy: You got to go with it.

00:25:53:17 - 00:26:19:02 Alison: Absolutely outstanding advice on that. My greatest insights when I've been in marketing and CMO roles was what I learned unexpectedly by walking a store floor, calling in, patching into a call center and at firsthand customer learning and experience is absolutely invaluable. So tremendous words of wisdom With that Jeremy, I want to thank you again. I know, especially in your busiest quarter, I really appreciate you taking the time for this conversation.

00:26:19:02 - 00:26:22:17 Alison: And I know our listeners join me in thanking you for the great advice you share.

00:26:24:08 - 00:26:33:20 Jeremy: Thank you, Alison. I really appreciate the time and enjoyed our conversation and wishing it right out there as it comes. Have a happy holiday and stay safe.

00:26:34:05 - 00:26:36:18 Alison: Thanks, Jeremy.

00:26:39:01 - 00:26:53:13 Thanks for joining us. Be sure to visit thecma.ca and sign up for your free my CMA account. It's a great way to stay connected and benefit from the latest marketing thought leadership news and industry trends.