The creator of Wallace and Gromit and Shaun the Sheep has more than doubled its turnover in the UK, thanks to the success of two Hollywood blockbusters.
Profits from Arthur Christmas and Pirates! In an Adventure with Scientists were not included in the results for Aardman Holdings, although the jump in revenues – from £53.5m in 2010 to £66.8m in 2011 – does include upfront fees from Sony Pictures, the company's Hollywood producer.
Aardman, which has published its annual accounts, said a new series of its pre-school programmes Timmy Time and Wallace and Gromit's World of Invention, both shown on the BBC, had been well-received and "continued to recoup quicker than expected".
However, fewer episodes of Timmy Time had been sold to other European countries, resulting in revenues from the EU falling from £4m to £1.8m. UK revenues, meanwhile, jumped from £9.5m to £22.3m.
In its broadcast division, Shaun the Sheep – the popular children's TV show featuring the character from the Wallace and Gromit short film A Close Shave – is likely to give the business a boost next year when a new series starts in January.
The commercials division posted its second-best results for a decade as advertisers continue to favour stop-motion animation over CGI effects.
Aardman has made adverts for companies including Nike, npower and the budget supermarket chain Aldi. The commercials business is probably best known for its Creature Comforts adverts for the Electricity Board.
Money continues to pour in from the sale of rights to the company's Oscar-winning film Wallace and Gromit: Curse of the Were-Rabbit and the Bafta-winning movie Chicken Run.
But America remains the company's biggest market, where it has a deal with Sony Pictures to create films; the US company also distributes Aardman's TV shows. US revenues rose £3m to £41.1m in 2011.
Arthur Christmas, released in November 2011, was Aardman's first feature film in five years. It grossed nearly $150m at the box office, with a budget of $100m.
In March this year, Aardman released Pirates!, voiced by Hugh Grant and David Tennant. The film, directed by Aardman's founder, Peter Lord, grossed $120m with a budget of $55m. However, it ran into controversy over its trailer, which poked fun at people with leprosy.
Aardman employs 115 staff, mainly at its Bristol head office, the accounts reveal, and paid its directors, Peter Lord and David Sproxton, just over £100,000 each.
