It’s the end of my weeks on the road that was…and the week that wasn’t!
After six of seven weeks on the road, it is nice to be home and back at my desk in the new Eastern District of the US toy industry… South Florida! Typically, many of us would be in NY at the Toy Fair this week. While there is no snow on the ground this week, it’s still pretty cold. Now is the time for all to consider what we are or are not missing by not being in NY this week, as deposits for space are already coming due for the 2025 show. As mentioned, the Hong Kong market week was productive, and slowly but surely, things are returning to form. After a week home in mid-January, I was off again for the best “pound for pound” toy show on the planet… the London Toy Fair! There is a ton of construction work going on to expand the Olympia Center, and surely this show will continue to grow, but for now, it’s pretty compact, easy to walk and shop, and everyone comes with their A game to show and sell.
At Basic Fun, we have put our stake in the ground, starting in the UK by selling directly to retail and expanding to the continent via distributor partners and via Amazon. We had a unique challenge this year with this show as the upgrades to the facility engineered a new staircase right through the middle of our stand! The venue has two show floor levels. Fortunately, we are able to work out a plan with the show organizers to design our stand around the fancy new staircase, making our booth look and feel like a SoHo loft. We had plenty of foot traffic, and the show was a huge success for us, and, I’d suspect, for all. Buyers from the UK were plentiful, as well as several from across the channel. Not surprisingly, the UK market is one of the biggest outside of the US for most American toy companies, and US-developed lines seem to take hold well. The exhibitors were a solid mix of UK-based, US, Euro, and Japanese-based companies and the powers from down under. While the UK is bordering on recession and a tepid consumer, the Brits typically have stiff upper lips and live the “Keep Calm and Carry On” spirit they are well known for! The big talk of the show was specialty retailer The Entertainer taking over buying and merchandising for mega mass merchant Tesco. The halls were buzzing about this, for sure.
It’s a serious show, but towards the end of each day, the taps, bottle caps, and champagne bottles open up in a variety of stands, and things lighten up as the din of sales chatter turns to the hum of small talk and bursts of laughter. It’s truly a pleasure to work this show, not to mention what an amazing city London is. I had a few great meals and got to take in a West End show before heading out for a four-day break in Prague to enjoy the sights and brews of that great city prior to attending the granddaddy of all toy shows in Nuremberg, Germany.
It was a pleasant three-hour car ride from Prague into Nuremberg on a cool sunny day as I rolled into town. It might surprise some that this was the first Nuremberg show where my company has exhibited since our founding in 2009. It was only the second time I ever attended this show in my more than 30 years in the business. This year was very different from the first–about 15 years ago. Back then, the show was so busy and attended that I had to stay far out of the city and needed six or seven stops on the train to get to the show. This year, I was able to score a room right next to the main train station in town, across the street from the old city walls. While not quite the old town in Prague, the old town section of Nuremberg is really beautiful and easy to walk around, with a number of great restaurants and a few that serve more than schnitzel and sausage…all with great beer! There are also a few great Irish bars in the town center that seem to attract a huge number of toy people. One so crowded you could barely move around inside but still really fun.
When I say “the granddaddy” of shows I mean it. There are more than 2,000 exhibitors, twice that of NY Toy Fair. More than 50,000 people attend the show, and the show floor is massive. It takes almost 20 minutes to walk from one of the anchor halls to the other end of the facility. That’s hall 4A where Basic Fun along with Bandai and Hasbro were stationed to hall 12A where the likes of Mattel and MGA were. It’s sort of like putting the bread at one of end the store and the eggs at the other. You have to move through the entire venue to see all the major players. The show was great, really well attended, and worked hard by the buyers.
The exhibitors really came to play big time. The booths were fantastic–a mix of big, small and medium with some wide open and others behind walls, not unlike NY this past October. It can certainly be intimidating and overwhelming, especially if you don’t have a set appointment agenda that manages the layout efficiently. You definitely get your steps in! I was able to meet with the show organizers, and they are going to work to improve the navigability of the show floor.
We were privileged to be invited to share Bandai’s booth since we are launching Littlest Pet Shop globally together, and the Nuremberg show is the big debut for Europe of the line. They were great hosts and great partners, and happily the line is already off to a terrific start at retail this year.
The show, like NY and London, runs for four full days, with the first two being really busy and then leveling off for the third day, which was still busy. I do have to admit I skipped out before the final day of each show, but given the massive size of the show, clearly a fourth day is needed. Buyers are serious and seriously working the show. Like in the US, many had already done a lot of their selections, style-outs and had finalized or were locking them down at the show. Others were seeing lines for the first time. As is typical for shows, there was not much actual order writing, but there was a ton of review and selections for follow up. The shows continue to be a part of the overall process of getting product placed at retail as well as allowing companies to develop their identities and profiles in the industry. Jazwares made a huge statement at the show, as did Moose. Both were nearby us in hall 4A. Like London there is a happy hour feel at the end of each day, but what I like most is that every other stand had a barista and was serving great espresso and coffee all day!
For the benefit of medium and smaller US manufacturers, I’d urge international and in particular European retailers to open up and embrace smaller-scale American toy companies to make it easier for us to enter your markets directly and through distributors. Just as I’m sure many Americans would love to speak more than one language, where does one start with that? If I know French, I don’t know German or Italian. The same goes for trying to set up distribution. Where does one begin? We hear so many times “if you want to do more business in Europe, set up in Europe” but as we know that can be hugely risky and expensive. That risk and expense is only going to be reflected in higher prices. If international retailers want more hot, new product at great prices, open up with American vendors to direct ship from China, whether directly or via our distributor partners. End of commercial!
The bottom line is these big shows, when they hit at the right times of the year, do so much for our industry. They bring us all together and provide venues to show off our products, and in the end, we are an industry of show-offs! It’s up to the vendors to “show and sell” and to make it worthwhile for the buyers to “show up and shop”! Let’s all do our best to make these shows pay off.
Nuremberg and London are great shows for the respective buyers in those regions large and small. The buyers really support the shows and are proud of their vendors. Nuremberg is certainly an interesting place for North American retailers to look for trends, but hopefully not at the expense of making the trip to NY Toy Fair where so many of the hottest trends can really be found. Europe is a great venue for American toy companies to begin to expand distribution. We’re a global industry and all of us should be open to buying and selling on a global basis.
We now have a long stretch until the next “official” shows, but the mini-LA previews, Licensing Show, and the big Fall LA previews will be here before we know it. Finally, to go on the record, we have put down our deposit for NY Toy Fair ’25, and Basic Fun plans to attend the show!
All the best for a great year for our industry in 2024!
Jay
