Icons of Value is a research programme examining how wildlife operates within contemporary economic and cultural systems. Using both qualitative and quantitative approaches, research within the group explores how wildlife icons function within global branding and how they relate to symbolic, cultural, and commercial forms of value.

Initial research analysing the Forbes Global 2000 demonstrates that wildlife icon use is systematically associated with higher brand sales, suggesting that wildlife plays an active role within a twenty-first-century symbolic economy. This work raises new questions about how human–wildlife relationships are shaped through modern economic systems and how wildlife icons operate as value-bearing assets within brand identity.

Current work examines how wildlife imagery moves through digital brand systems and contributes to coherence across online environments. Future research explores how wildlife icons are interpreted by consumers and how symbolic value influences identity, meaning, and human engagement with nature.

Sitting at the intersection of ecology, brand theory, and consumer behaviour, the programme offers a new perspective on how wildlife circulates through contemporary culture and modern economies.