An Angry Bird in the hand

The hugely popular Angry Birds franchise has gone a notch higher. The success of its fabled stickers and albums is to see the collection expand to include trading cards.

The largest manufacturer of playing cards in India, Parksons Cartamundi, has partnered with E-max which has teamed up with game developer Rovio Entertainment. Under this arrangement, Parksons Cartamundi will manufacture and distribute the Angry Birds Collectible Trading Cards for the first time in India.

The slingshot-throwing tiny, brightly hued birds at wooden fortresses have been vanquishing pigs taking shelter inside, and have amassed their own faithful tribe in India. Trading cards are the new norm, for when a game like Angry Birds becomes an international phenomenon, it is extremely hard to keep the core product from going stale. Rovio apparently has been able to conquer this problem and remain at the top of the charts with each successive release of Angry Birds.

Take, for instance, Rovio's partnership with LucasArts for Angry Birds Star Wars, with its combination of the familiar birds mixed with the lore of a galaxy far away. For many of its fans, the birds have provided more than a refuge.

In India, the Angry Birds trading cards are set to offer a new and revolutionary way of playing trading cards that resembles the traditional rock, paper, and scissors game.

Trading cards (TC) have usually been collectible cards which allow one to compete with points based on attack-defence and strength-speed. With the new Angry Birds TC, the method of playing will be rock, slingshot, and TNT.

The game strategy, now having adapted the rock, paper, scissors playing method to the Angry Birds licence, works this way: The rock breaks the slingshot, the slingshot wins over the TNT by triggering an ‘explosion from the distance’, and then the TNT ‘breaks’ the rock with its own explosion.

As Kapil Kejriwal, executive director, Parksons Cartamundi notes, “The cards promise tremendous potential and further reinforce the company’s vision to be at the forefront of collectible card manufacturing by consistently offering innovative and revolutionary products.” He adds that the company will be launching a host of unique and engaging products across the same category in the near future.

The Angry Bird Trading Cards collection consists of 180 cards with a simple game play element designed to attract and entertain young customers. It will be available across the country in all major toy stores at a reasonable Rs 300. The individual flow packs consisting of five cards each will be priced at Rs 20.

Brand partners

Most partners seem to be easily riding the tail feathers of Angry Birds - branding partners range from small Finnish chocolate makers to Swedish clothing chain Hennes & Mauritz to US toy maker Hasbro.

Incidentally, Rovio is said to have more than 400 partners, from Coca-Cola to Intel to Kraft and has collectively developed more than 20,000 products on sale just about everywhere.

Rovio is also embedding Angry Birds in everyday devices. Earlier this year, Rovio teamed up with Samsung to include a motion-controlled Angry Birds game on its smart TVs. In November, the company launched the Rovio Channel, letting users of the Samsung sets download games as well as the coming Angry Birds Toons show and a comic book series.

In India, Parksons Cartamundi was established by the Kejriwal family of the Parksons group which has been engaged in the printing and playing cards business since 1955.

The company’s printing capacity today stands at 40 million decks of playing cards a year which are exported to 14 countries worldwide. Parksons entered into a strategic alliance with the Belgian Cartamundi group, world leader in playing cards in 2010.

What is interesting is that Rovio’s Angry Birds soft drinks are reportedly soon to outsell Coke and Pepsi in Finland. The fizzy drinks are to hit shelves in New Zealand and Australia before making an appearance in other nations.

Staying power

The Finland-based Rovio is of the opinion that thinking of other enterprises to support the main Angry Birds brand is the key to prolonging its staying power.

Angry Birds has also inspired a wide array of businesses, everything from plush toys to a huge endeavour such as a theme park in China. The company has also explored other ventures such as advertisements, animation, digital services and book publishing since the game was launched in 2009.