Most ecommerce brands compete for attention on the same two platforms, against the same competitors, at the same rising cost. Brand licensing is the other way in: you borrow a fanbase somebody else spent decades building, put it on the product, and pay for it out of sales.

David Born has worked in licensing for about twenty years. He was inside Warner Bros. Consumer Products and at Cartoon Network, on the side of the table that decides which brands get a license. For the last twelve years he has run his own licensing agency, and a growing share of that work is now ecommerce brands.

This episode is the practical version. What a first license costs, line by line. How long it takes before anything can be sold. And why the character on the mood board is almost always the wrong one to start with.

What we get into:

- The minimum guarantee, and why it is owed whether or not a single unit sells

- The royalty rate he says an ecommerce brand pays on average, and the worked example behind it

- The two sales-forecast mistakes that kill a deal before it is drafted

- Why the hottest IP in the world is the worst possible first license

- Twelve months from first email to first sale, and where that time goes

- The ten working days every approval takes, and what resets the clock

- What a license does to the value of a company on the day it is sold

- The reason a licensing agent tells people licensing is a non-starter

The anchor case is Plum Deluxe, a loose leaf tea brand his agency works with. David relays what founder Andy Hayes told him: ten years in business, never licensed anything, then a Peanuts collection at Christmas that sold out in twelve days, with less ad spend than a normal launch. Those are Andy's numbers as David reports them.

CHAPTERS

00:00 Intro and what licensing actually covers

03:45 What a first license actually costs

04:38 Minimum guarantee and royalty, defined

05:37 The worked example on a Hello Kitty deal

10:52 Never make the hottest IP the first one

12:45 Who says yes to a brand with no track record

18:49 Twelve months from first email to first sale

19:56 The 10-day approval clock that resets

26:38 What has to be true before a license helps

27:17 Licensing does not save a struggling brand

28:06 A ten-year-old tea brand's first license

30:15 The second collection and the basket effect

34:43 Cash flow, margin and absorbing the royalty

40:02 The most expensive mistake he has seen

41:00 What a license does to a sale of the company

42:22 Overrated or underrated, five calls

45:29 The first move for an operator next week

FIND DAVID

Born Licensing: https://bornlicensing.com

Born to License: https://borntolicense.com

Learn to License: https://www.learntolicense.com

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidborn1

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/davidb0rn

Ecom Growth Insider: https://ecomgrowthinsider.com

Figures are David's own, or his clients' as he reports them. Nothing here is legal or financial advice.