The Wiggles Pty Ltd



The Wiggles Pty Ltd is the business created by the founders of the Australian children's music group The Wiggles. The group was protective of their brand, and adopted many of the same business practices as The Cockroaches, the former band of Anthony Field and Jeff Fatt, two of their founding members. They remained as independent as possible, and retained full creative control and ownership of every aspect of their business. As Field stated, The Wiggles Pty Ltd was "not your regular 'corporate culture'." The group made decisions by consensus and made business decisions based upon their experience as performers and their knowledge of early childhood education. They did not tour with a large troupe of dancers, cast, and crew until the late 1990s, and had high expectations regarding the behaviour and attitude of everyone associated with the group. They made careful decisions regarding their endorsements of toys and other products, and avoided over-extending their brand by only licensing products that correlated with their image.

The Wiggles formally consolidated their business in 2005, and consistently appeared in Business Review Weekly's yearly list of Australia's richest entertainers. They faced difficulty in producing a television show with the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, so they created thirteen episodes of a self-produced television series. By 2002, they began airing their TV programs exclusively with the ABC and became "the most successful property that the ABC has represented in the pre-school genre". In 2009, they partnered with the digital cable channel Sprout to broadcast their TV shows. In 2012, due to the effects of the worldwide recession, they cut back on much of their international expansions.

Other ventures of The Wiggles Pty Ltd included franchising their concept to South America, Taiwan, and other countries, opening "Wiggles World" sections in theme parks, and online offerings.