Rovio

How Angry Birds Moved Into Retail

When your brand grows, Shipwire has the right plan

When Angry Birds-creator Rovio wanted to leverage the brand’s phenomenal popularity by merchandising plush toys, cell phone covers and a host of other products, the game-makers had choices to make:

Rovio could go traditional by licensing Angry Birds and letting another company handle manufacturing, sales and shipping – good enough for market leaders such as Disney — or it could go high-risk, investing heavily in infrastructure and staff and handling sales and shipping itself.

Instead, Rovio cost-effectively tested direct sales to consumers by using today’s technology and turning to web-based partners experienced in e-commerce and shipping.

Because of Shipwire’s global logistics, we know customers get what they want and get it quickly and efficiently.

— Mikael Hed, CEO Rovio

It used Shopify for a virtual store and enlisted Shipwire to manage the supply chain, warehousing and shipping.

Rovio hit the sweet spot: scalable-costs and expert partner support. The test was so successful that the merchandising strategy quickly became a core component of Rovio’s plans to capitalize on the Angry Birds brand.

“When we established the potential for product sales, we knew a huge market had to be served in ways that we, as gamers, didn’t understand,” says Ville Heijari, Rovio’s VP of Franchise Development. “So we did what gamers do: we went to people who had solved the sales and shipping challenges and we used their experience. Bringing in Shipwire was like finding the ultimate weapon or secret room in a game.”

Working with Niklas Kari, Rovio’s e-commerce store manager, the Shipwire staff developed a cost-efficient fulfillment plan that not only responded to present demand but helped Rovio forecast sales by giving consumers a pre-order option for new products.

“By helping us project demand, we avoided static inventory costs, and Shipwire could gear up for when the product arrived,” Kari says. “I know that meant some massive shipping days for Shipwire, but there was never a problem – even on the heaviest shipping days.”

Today, when Kari wants data about inventory, shipping costs, return rates or scores of other points, he uses his Shipwire dashboard, which is easily customized for key information, screen shots and reports, right down to a specific warehouse.

Plus, the Shopify storefront is one of the more than 50 ecommerce solutions that easily integrate with Shipwire.

Ready for global expansion

The Shipwire partnership came just in time for more Angry Birds success: a Super Bowl commercial promoting the 20th Century Fox movie “Rio” and Rovio’s new Angry Birds Rio! game, then plugs for the mobile game download in T-Mobile and Sprint commercials.

“Because of Shipwire’s global logistics, we know customers get what they want and get it quickly and efficiently,” CEO Mikael Hed says.

Rovio serves the world from Shipwire warehouses in Los Angeles and London, taking advantage of Shipwire’s ability to put the product near customers, which means buyers get one- to two-day shipping (and easy returns) with the most efficient available pricing structure.

The game-maker’s U.S.-based manufacturer simply sends the products to two of Shipwire’s five warehouses without ever involving Rovio staff. That frees Rovio leadership to pursue global brand status for Angry Birds, including recently announced expansion plans for China.

“Having Shipwire as a partner means we’ve delegated logistics to the leader in outsourced product fulfillment, allowing us to focus on what we do best,” Hed says.

Shipwire: our game is logistics and we play to win. Try Shipwire for free.