King Features Syndicate
$350
American
About the artist:
King Features Syndicate, Inc. is an American content distribution and animation studio, consumer product licensing and print syndication company owned by Hearst Communications that distributes about 150 comic strips, newspaper columns, editorial cartoons, puzzles, and games to nearly 5,000 newspapers worldwide. King Features Syndicate also produces intellectual properties, develops new content and franchises, like The Cuphead Show!, which it produced with Netflix, and licenses its classic characters and properties.
King Features Syndicate is a unit of Hearst Holdings, Inc., which combines the Hearst Corporation's cable-network partnerships, television programming and distribution activities, and syndication companies. King Features' affiliate syndicates are North America Syndicate and Cowles Syndicate.
King Features had a series of hits during the 1930s with the launch of Blondie (1930–present), Flash Gordon (1934–2003), Mandrake the Magician (1934–2013), and The Phantom (1936–present). In March 1936, a fictional, magical animal called Eugene the Jeep was added to Popeye, and trademarked.
King Features remained a "powerhouse" syndicate throughout the 1950s and the 1960s. In 1965 it launched a children's comic and coloring page.
In 1986, King Features acquired the Register and Tribune Syndicate for $4.3 million. Later that year, Hearst bought News America Syndicate (formerly Publishers-Hall). By this point, with both King Features and News America (renamed North America Syndicate), Hearst led all syndication services with 316 features.
In 2007, King Features donated its collection of comic-strip proof sheets (two sets of over 60 years' accumulation) to the Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum and the Michigan State University Comic Art Collection while retaining the collection in electronic form for reference purposes.
In November 2015, King Features released a book, entitled "King of the Comics: One Hundred Years of King Features Syndicate" to commemorate its 100th anniversary. The book features a compilation of strips and the histories behind King Features strips.
As of 2016, with 62 strips being syndicated, Hearst was considered the second-largest comics service, second only to Uclick (now known as Andrews McMeel Syndication).
In December 2017, King Features appointed CJ Kettler as president of the company. Kettler previously was CEO of Sunbow Entertainment and the executive producer of the Netflix series Carmen Sandiego.
King Features Syndicate, Inc. is an American content distribution and animation studio, consumer product licensing and print syndication company owned by Hearst Communications that distributes about 150 comic strips, newspaper columns, editorial
$350