More airtime for brand Fergie

Oct 24 2009 by Iain Laing, The Journal

THE Duchess of York has sold TV and merchandising rights to her recent children’s books and her “brand” in the US and Canada as part of a deal with film-maker Handmade.

Sarah Ferguson will receive substantial amounts of money for the deal, according to Handmade – the group behind hits such as Withnail and I, Time Bandits and more recently 50 Dead Men Walking.

The deal comes amid mounting speculation over the duchess’s finances after the wind-up of her US firm Hartmoor, which is expected to close before the end of the year with debts of around £600,000.

The winding up of Hartmoor – a firm set up to manage the duchess’s US career in publishing, public speaking and media work – follows the ending of a contract she held with WeightWatchers last year.

Handmade plans to turn Ms Ferguson’s children’s books Tea For Ruby and Little Red, which have been highly popular in America, into animated series.

It has also signed her for a six-part series with National Geographic retracing the journey of great women explorers, called In the Footsteps Of, while it is planning further merchandising opportunities for the Sarah Ferguson brand.

Handmade has bought US animation cartoon studio Animated Collective to start work on the children’s series, launching a new business called Handmade Kids.

The duchess will join the board of Handmade Kids as a non-executive director, according to the group.

She said: “The launch of Handmade Kids brings together several extremely well-regarded brands and children’s programming.

“I am pleased that Tea For Ruby and the Little Red series will be developed by what we firmly believe will become a leading children’s entertainment company.”

Handmade already owned the rights to US children’s character Eloise, with books published by the same group that bought out Ms Ferguson’s latest children’s books.