Haven Licensing has announced its appointment to represent Line Friends for merchandise and promotions in Australia and New Zealand. Line Friends is the lifestyle and consumer products brand featuring characters from the phenomenal Line messenger app – which, since its inception in 2011, has quickly exploded in popularity across over 230 countries and 19 different languages – currently boasting over 220million monthly active users.
About Line Friends
Featuring an assortment of quirky characters such as Brown the Bear and his love interest Cony the Rabbit, Line’s ultra-expressive, supersized stickers express emotion that would be difficult to sum up in a text typed on a smartphone. With over 2.4 billion of these stickers sent daily, the popularity of the characters is driving an incredible merchandise program internationally. More than twenty standalone stores have launched across Asia and thirty pop-up stores and events have opened over the past two years across an impressive number of cities in Asia and even in New York’s Times Square. These stores have been a huge success, with in excess of 22million customers visiting to snap up products – and Haven are excited to bring the brand down under for the first time!
Commentary
“We are out of our minds excited about Line”, said Yvonne King, Director, Haven Licensing. “There are already 600,000 regular users of the app in Aust/NZ and growing, and we can’t wait to bring those fans a sophisticated range of merchandise and promotions. It is a privilege to be catching this one on the upward trajectory and be a part of the beginnings of a powerhouse evergreen brand.”
Sowon Jon, Head of Licensing for Line Friends said, “We are extremely excited to be building a partnership with Haven and introducing Line Friends to Australia and New Zealand. As a life style brand targeting teens and young adults, we are confident for Line Friends to create a buzz in the new market.”
Popular Culture
Global icons like UNIQLO, Swarovski, Moleskin, Vans and more have also tapped into the popularity of Line Friends. New character Choco the bear (Brown’s sister) has even appeared in magazine fashion shoots this month, further cementing Line Friends’ place in popular culture. And whilst cherubic in appearance, Line Friends are distinctly adult and engage in fun, offbeat scenarios.
