Housewares Business-to-business magazine for housewares retailers and their suppliers
Brand extension and licensing agency Licensing Link has been appointed to represent the Finnish design-led brand Finlayson in the UK.
Licensing Link will be matching Finalyson’s designs with ‘best in class’ licensees, with the focus on kitchenware, homewares, bedding and soft furnishings, stationery and accessories.
Risto Voutilainen, chairman of the board of Finlayson, said: “We’re excited to have Licensing Link as a partner. Our international growth strategy is based on global licensing and so far, we’e received a lot of interest from different markets globally. In 2016, we’re expecting several new partners in the UK market to join in licensing the Finlayson brand and Licensing Link has an important role in the process.”
Finlayson manufactures interior textiles including bedding, bathroom and kitchen textiles. It has 14 stores and 20 pop-up stores in Finland. Retailers offer a broad range of Finlayson products in Finland and in other Nordic countries, as well as in online stores.
Licensing Link director Ian Wickham commented: “This is a hugely exciting opportunity and we’re incredibly honoured to be working with Finlayson. The new owners undertook extensive quantitative customer research before deciding in which countries they would start to roll out their global strategy.
“Of the sample used in the UK (20-65 year old women), 85% living in conurbations said they value contemporary design and 84% referenced a like for those designs coming from Scandinavia, so we see this as significant.
“We have in excess of 100,000 different designs to utilise, built up over almost 200 years. With retailers, this has to be of interest as they continue to cry out for differentiation.”
