Dog Ears Acclaim Continues to Grow in Leaps and Bounds

by Startacus Admin

From local beginnings, children’s media company Dog Ears continues to grow, with acclaim now coming from as far as China, with a potential Emmy Kids Award to boot...

"From little acorns, mighty oak trees grow" (said someone similar, somewhere). 

Which leads nicely-ish into our introduction to Dog Ears, a small but growing children's media company based in Derry, Northern Ireland. According to history - The City of Derry name comes from the Old Irish word Daire (modern: Doire) meaning 'oak grove' or 'oak wood'.

And this is one Derry business that whilst starting small, continues to grow like an oak of a business, with international accolade coming too.

Dog Ears create quality children’s IP across various platforms, working collaboratively with other companies and creatives to find the very best partners and homes for their creative projects.

Since they first set up back in 2010, they have worked on various different creative projects, from publishing picture books, running their own children's story festival, releasing Ireland’s first children’s book app, and co-producing two series of the acclaimed animated pre-school show Puffin Rock, with their partners Cartoon Saloon and Penguin Random House.

The Puffin Rock animated TV series, still only a couple of years old, was quickly picked up for broadcasting worldwide including on RTÉjr in Ireland, Nick Jr, BBC Alba and now Channel 5 in the UK - as well as streaming in all major territories worldwide on Netflix.

Narrated by Chris O’Dowd, the TV show threads a charming mix of natural history facts, and pre-school learning relationship dynamics and humour, all within a beautifully drawn and animated world. We ourselves here at Startacus HQ like it a lot.

Recently the nominations for the International Emmy Kids Awards included Puffin Rock, a massive accolade for both Dog Ears, their partners Cartoon Saloon and Penguin Random House, and of course Netflix (you might have heard of them). 

In the same few weeks as this nomination, it was announced that Puffin Rock had arrived in China as part of a multi-license deal with China Nebula Group (CNB), including TV rights, digital, merchandising and toys. Launched on Tencent, China's giant digital media network, Puffin Rock secured almost 55 million streams in its first few weeks on air.

Axinaer, CEO of China Nebula Group, said "I think Puffin Rock is one of the best animation series I’ve seen internationally, and this was why I wanted to bring it to China from the first time I saw it. Puffin Rock has extremely high artistic quality, and brings really positive and healthy content to young children."  

John McDaid, Creative Director at Dog Ears went on to say:

"The global success of Puffin Rock is a huge source of pride for us, and a testament to the hard work of the teams at Dog Ears and Cartoon Saloon. 

Our company has grown alongside the project - we began development on Puffin Rock a year after setting up - so our puffins are very close to our hearts. Hearing about our International Emmy nomination, as well as the amazing numbers coming in from China, really brings home just how far we’ve come."    

With the Dog Ears team currently working on a slate of new projects, we look forward to hearing more about this growing children’s media company as they continue to grow. We expect big things and we don’t think we’re barking up the wrong tree.

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Published on: 20th October 2017