About HIT Entertainment
HIT Entertainment, owned by private equity investment group Apax Partners, is one of the world's leading independent children's entertainment producers and rights-owners. HIT's portfolio includes properties, such as Barney™, Bob the Builder™, Thomas & Friends™, Pingu™, Fireman Sam™, Angelina Ballerina™ and Rainbow Magic™. HIT represents Chapman Entertainment's Fifi and the Flowertots™ and Roary the Racing Car™ in North America and Japan, as well as Wallace & Gromit™, Shaun the Sheep™, Timmy Time™ and Aardman Classics from Aardman Animations. HIT also acts as a worldwide representative for The Jim Henson Company's library of classic family brands and as representative for The Wiggles® in the UK.
Launched in 1989, HIT's lines of business span television and video production, content distribution, publishing, consumer products licensing, live events and attractions and has operations in the UK, US, Canada, Hong Kong and Japan. HIT is a part-owner of US preschool channel, PBS KIDS Sprout℠, and international preschool channel JimJam, (outside of the US, UK and China).
For more information, visit http://www.hitentertainment.com.
Natasha Fishman Joins HIT Entertainment As Vice President, Retail Development
05/31/2006New York, NY
HIT Entertainment, a leading provider of quality preschool entertainment, today announced the appointment of Natasha Fishman as Vice President, Retail Development. In this role, Natasha will develop and implement the retail development programs and promotions for HIT's portfolio of premier brands, including Barney™, Bob the Builder™, Thomas & Friends™, and Angelina Ballerina™, among others, across all categories. In addition, Natasha will oversee all relationships with key buyers and marketers at retail. She is based in the company's New York office and reports to Jamie Cygielman, Senior Vice President, Consumer Products.
Natasha joins HIT Entertainment with more than 14 years of experience in sales and marketing, merchandising and strategic planning. Most recently, she served as Director, Retail Strategy at Sesame Workshop, where she led the development and execution of retail programs for Sesame Street, as well as the introduction of Sesame Beginnings. Prior to that, she was the Director, Merchandising - Online Stores at Scholastic, where she was part of the team that piloted the company's e-commerce efforts. Natasha began her career at Federated Department Stores and held positions in management and buying with the Home Depot and 1-800 Flowers.com.
"Natasha brings a great deal of retail experience to our organization and we are thrilled to welcome her to the HIT Entertainment team," said Cygielman. "She has an incredible creative energy and unique ideas and we are excited for her to develop innovative retail programs across our collection of top preschool brands."
About HIT Entertainment
HIT Entertainment, owned by private equity investment group Apax Partners since June 2005, is one of the world’s leading independent children’s entertainment producers and rights-owners. HIT’s portfolio includes internationally renowned children’s properties, such as Bob the Builder™, Barney™, Thomas & Friends™, Pingu™, Rubbadubbers™ and Angelina Ballerina™. HIT acts as a representative for The Wiggles® in the UK, US and Canada and as worldwide representative for The Jim Henson Company’s library of classic family brands, including Fraggle Rock™. HIT also owns the Guinness World Records™ publishing and television property and Fireman Sam™, a joint venture with S4C. Launched in 1989, HIT’s lines of business span television and video production (including studios in the US and the UK), publishing, consumer products licensing and live events. With a catalog of more than 1,000 hours of young children’s programming, HIT sells its shows to more than 240 countries worldwide, in more than 40 different languages and has operations in the UK, US, Canada, Hong Kong and Japan. In 2005, the Company joined Comcast Corporation, PBS and Sesame Workshop to launch PBS KIDS Sprout℠, a 24-hour digital cable channel and VOD service for preschoolers. For more information, visit www.hitentertainment.com.
