Crazy Frog was born in 2002 when Erik Wernquist posted his “The Annoying Thing” animation on a 3D internet forum and asked for feedback.

To date, the brand has sold over one million plush toys, one million garments and even 150,000 birthday cakes. All this on top of 20 million mobile downloads and two million CDs. 

To say it caught people’s attention is an understatement - as soon as it leaped onto the internet people immediately started to send the animation to their friends and the internet ‘viral’ was underway. 

In November 2004, backed by TV advertising on music channels, Jamster launched the Crazy Frog ringtone. This was followed by the debut single “Axel F” in May 2005 – and when it went to number one in 18 countries, the licensing world sat up and listened.

AT Merchandise was formed in June 2005 to exploit the merchandising and licensing opportunities available with Crazy Frog.

As Steve Manley, one of the two founding directors, explains: “I first saw the Crazy Frog animation on the internet in August 2004. My six-year-old son loved it and asked me to play it every time his friends came round.

“He played it constantly, and soon wanted a T-shirt but there were none available. In November that year, I got in touch with Crazy Frog’s animator Erik Wernquist and asked him if I could make a one-off T-shirt for my son. Erik was agreeable and by this time Jamster had started advertising the ringtones on TV, so my son and his mates were even more excited about the Frog. I got back in touch with Erik to see if I could make more T-shirts. At first he was reluctant and wary of people risking their money on his creation, but once I assured him it was a risk I was willing to take, he gave me the go ahead. I printed 400 T-shirts in March 2005 and they were snapped up in three weeks – proving just how successful the character already was.”

Realising the enormous untapped potential of the brand, Steve then teamed up in April with me to create AT Merchandise Limited, which recently became part of intellectual property rights agency, AT New Media.

Unusually, Crazy Frog, aka The Annoying Thing, has three brand owners and with a licensing programme that had grown rapidly for eight months, it became clear that there was a need to reconcile branding needs for use by licencees. Also there was no consistency and several variations of the character were circulating. 

It was at this point that Red Central came on board and were asked to develop a comprehensive brand and style guide for the brand. Red Central was chosen due to its outstanding portfolio and the impressive sample design pieces it produced for The Annoying Thing.

Their creative team produced a full style guide featuring The Annoying Thing alongside its ‘Ring ding ding!’ and ‘What’s going on?’ catchphrases.

"The aim for the branding style guide was to merge contemporary 3D graphics with backgrounds suitable for the most annoying thing in the world,” says Managing Director at Red Central, Steve Pearce. “We had some very specific guidelines to work to so that all of the original charm of the character was maintained and the brand could be targeted at both boys and girls as well as a limited adult appeal.”

The style guide has  been very well received by licencees, such as Vivid Imaginations, Pyramid Posters and Gemma International, who realised the enormous potential of the brand and were amongst the first to sign on the dotted line.