Guardians of the Clay: How Aardman Is Building Fandoms, Not Fads 

Susan Bolsover, senior licensing manager at Aardman Animations, on why Wallace & Gromit and Shaun the Sheep are reaching new generations, and why sometimes the right answer is simply no. 

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At a studio that takes years to produce minutes of animation, the pressure to make every commercial decision count is enormous. For Aardman Animations, the Bristol-born home of Wallace & Gromit, Shaun the Sheep, and Morph, that pressure has driven a deliberate rethink of how the studio approaches licensing.  

Speaking at Spring Fair 2026, Susan Bolsover, Aardman's senior licensing manager, set out the philosophy shaping the studio's next chapter: storytelling first, fandom always, and the courage to walk away from the wrong deal. 

One team, one story 

The most visible change at Aardman in recent years is structural. What was once a collection of siloed departments, licensing and consumer products, content distribution, digital and creative content, brand partnerships now operates as a single, unified team. "Rather than everybody working in a sort of separate silo, we all work collaboratively together," Bolsover explained. The integration means that a collaboration conceived as a retail product can loop back into content, and vice versa. 

The benefits showed up vividly in a recent Japanese partnership. Aardman licensed Shaun the Sheep's name and likeness to Hitsuji Bungaku, a Japanese rock band whose own name contains the word for sheep. The band re-recorded the programme's theme tune in Japanese, incorporated Shaun into their visual identity, and launched a merchandise drop on the e-commerce platform Zozo Town. What started as a licensing agreement ended with Hitsuji Bungaku's version becoming the official theme for Shaun the Sheep Season 7 on NHK. "Who knew it was going to explode into something that we probably hadn't quite thought it would at the beginning," Bolsover said. 

Standing on the shoulders of giants 

This is Aardman's 50th anniversary year, and Bolsover is wary of the word "heritage." "Sometimes heritage can make things feel old," she said, "and what we really want to do is stand on the shoulders of that foundation and build for the future." Her previous experience managing Peter Rabbit at Frederick Warne & Co. has sharpened her instinct for what she calls "classic brands": properties with deep fan loyalty that must be kept culturally relevant without alienating the audiences who grew up with them. 

The studio's answer is to work thematically, planning creative directions one to two years out. This year, Wallace & Gromit's theme is home, fitting for characters whose every adventure begins and ends in their terraced house on West Wallaby Street.  

That single idea generates an entire ecosystem of potential partnerships: cleaning products for spring, cosy apparel, family pyjamas. Next year, the focus shifts to companionship. Shaun, meanwhile, is being positioned around collectiveness and sustainability, underpinned by Aardman's own One Farm Initiative. 

Going global without losing the plot 

One of Aardman's most significant competitive advantages is the non-verbal nature of its characters. Shaun bleats; Gromit communicates entirely through expression; even Wallace's most memorable moments are physical rather than linguistic. "From a content perspective they really travel," Bolsover noted. "We don't have to do an awful lot of dubbing." That visual storytelling creates a foundation that each international market can build on in its own way. 

In Japan, the concept of fuwa fuwa, loosely translated as fluffiness or softness, has become a creative lens for Shaun, unlocking clothing, food and beverage, and sustainable product categories. In South Korea, a collaboration with a baseball team overlaid team kit onto pre-existing Aardman artwork; a partnership with the skincare brand Aveeno tied Shaun's "counting sheep" associations to a lavender sleep range. For collectors in China, a glassware brand whose only other licensed partnership had been with the British Library was given latitude to reinterpret Gromit's proportions in ways that kept the character's DNA intact while reimagining its form. 

Design adaptation, Bolsover emphasised, does not mean abandoning the characters' essence. "It's got to make sense for the product, it's got to make sense for the category, and it's got to still look like our characters in some way." The line is drawn at meaningful visual departure, not at creative reinterpretation. 

"We're just guardians for now. Other people will come after us. But we're the guardians of these characters, and that's how I think of all of them."  - Susan Bolsover, Aardman Animations 

Fandom over fads, and the importance of saying no 

The conversation's sharpest passage came when Bolsover addressed what separates strong licensing partnerships from failures. Her answer was blunt: relevance and relatability. She invoked a pair of cautionary tales from the archive, Colgate's foray into ready meals and Cosmopolitan's branded yogurts, as examples of brand extension so disconnected from the source that they actively confused consumers. "There's no relatability there," she said. "It feels like a brand slap." 

For Aardman, the discipline runs deeper than avoiding embarrassment. It is a strategic commitment to the long game. "If you're building a fandom, you're thinking about the long term," Bolsover said. A deal that generates exciting press coverage but sits awkwardly with the fan community is not just commercially risky, it is a small erosion of the trust that makes classic brands valuable in the first place. "It's as important to say no as it is to say yes, for the health of your brand. I really do believe that." 

Her three tips for brands considering licensing today distilled this philosophy into practice:  

• First, ask honestly what a licence will do for your product, will it open doors, reach new customers, enhance existing lines?  

• Second, tell a story, because consumers actively look for the connective tissue between a character and a product.  

• And third, be prepared to say not yet rather than no forever. The wrong timing is not the same as the wrong partnership. "It might be on your road map. So don't just say yes now. Think about where it might fit down the line." 

What comes next 

Looking ahead, Bolsover is most animated about two areas: digital content and live experiences. Aardman is expanding its short-form digital output to bridge the long gaps between stop-motion productions, and actively supporting the fan-created content that surfaces organically around its characters. At the same time, the studio is working to join up its physical touchpoints, from the Wallace & Gromit attraction at Blackpool Pleasure Beach to the exhibition at the V&A in London, into a coherent experience ecosystem.  

The goal, she said, is to make sure that every strand of the business, digital, consumer products, live experiences, and brand partnerships, amplifies the others rather than operating in isolation. For a studio whose characters have spent fifty years making people laugh, feel at home, and reach for their wallets, that kind of joined-up thinking feels less like a corporate strategy and more like common sense. The worlds of Wallace, Gromit, and Shaun are richer for being shared and Aardman, it seems, is only just getting started. 

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Susan Bolsover spoke at Spring Fair 2026. Aardman Animations is based in Bristol and celebrates its 50th anniversary this year. 

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