Deadline 10 May

LIMA has opened the voting for the 2013 LIMA Licensing Excellence Awards and is urging LIMA members to get online and vote for their favourites before the deadline of 10 May.

Representing the UK licensing industry are the Victoria & Albert Museum, Avon and Global Merchandising. This is the third year in a row that the Victoria & Albert Museum has been nominated in the category of Best Art or Design programme – last year it fought off stiff competition to notch up a second successive win. This is the first nomination for both Avon and Global Merchandising – Avon for its Strictly Come Dancing/Dancing with the Stars Beauty Collection and Global Merchandising/1D Media Limited for its work for boy band, One Direction.

Nominations in other categories include licensing organisations such as Nars Cosmetics, Mattel, Coca Cola, Warner Bros and Walt Disney/Marvel Entertainment, and properties including The Very Hungry Caterpillar, Andy Warhol, Monster High, UEFA 2012, Hello Kitty and The Hunger Games. From outside the US, there are also nominees from New Zealand (New Zealand Post for its Hobbit coins and stamps), Germany (Topps for its Star Wars Force Attax Trading Cards), Brazil (Exim Licensing Group for Strawberry Shortcake) and China (Beijing Dream Castle Culture Company for its work on Ali the Fox).

The LIMA International Licensing Excellence awards are the licensing industry’s most influential international awards, recognising outstanding achievements in licensing during 2012. Licensors, licensees, agents and retailers can put themselves forward in any of the 17 award categories, which cover the whole licensing spectrum, from toys to entertainment, retailing to art and sport. Only licensing programmes or products retailing during 2012 can be considered.

The accolades will be handed out at the LIMA Opening Night Awards Ceremony at Licensing International Expo in Las Vegas on Tuesday 18th June.
Kelvyn Gardner, Managing Director of LIMA UK, comments: “It’s been a very strong field of nominations this year with international representation, including three from the UK. We are really excited for our entries and very pleased that the V&A has been recognised with a third nomination in a row. It’s now up to the LIMA membership to vote on their favourites – so please make your voice heard, don’t miss the chance to vote and recognise the great work of all these companies.”

To vote, please visit and login to the the LIMA website www.licensing.org and follow the directions.