Team calendar earns licensee inaugural best women’s merchandise award
Using its fancy footwork to turn around a new licensed product in whistlestop time has not only led Danilo to produce a winning calendar, but also saw it score an award from Arsenal football club.
The honour came at last week’s Arsenal FC 2023 licensee day at the club’s Emirates Stadium in London, where the official licensed calendar and card publisher built on the previous year’s award for working with the club for over 10 years.
“We won the award this year for the Arsenal FC Women’s 2023 A3 Calendar which was launched last year,” licensing director Dan Grant told PG Buzz. “It’s one of only a few product lines specifically developed for the Arsenal Women’s FC merchandise range and Danilo are very proud to have been able to support the team as we see women’s football growing in popularity every year.
To make the award even more special it was presented to the Danilo team by Faye White, who is the ex-Arsenal Women’s FC and England Women’s captain – and Dan added she “is someone, quite rightly very proud to have helped get women’s football to the size and scale that we see it at today”.
He said the calendar was a joint opportunity between Danilo and the Gunners’ licensing team, who “approached us quite late in the calendar season last year” and the product was put together is a very short period and produced in time for fans to buy before last Christmas and the new year.
Dan added: “It was something I was keen to support personally, given the rise of the women’s game, and also felt it was good opportunity for Danilo to work alongside one of our most established licensors on a new project.”
Danilo sold the calendar across general retail as well as supplying the Arsenal club shop so it was in front of fans attending games at the Emirates – and then went straight into working on a 2024 edition which is available now.
Having worked with the club for over 15 years, Danilo earned the 10-year-plus licensee award at the event last year, and Dan added: “I feel very proud the Danilo team has been recognised for their efforts in delivering this product to market in such a short space of time and for being the first people to win the women’s merchandise award.”
It was judged by Arsenal’s retail teams, who felt the calendar was the stand-out item in this category, and Dan thanked the club’s licensing team of Leigh Simpson, Tom Jarman and Ellie Holt-Rix for their support in helping deliver the product to market as well as the Danilo studio and production teams for making it happen.
The company is continuing to grow its range of women’s football calendars and greeting cards, with the 2024 range including products for four teams – Arsenal, Chelsea, Spurs and England.
