Let’s start with some of the more positive news of the week. The Entertainer has completed its rollout in Tesco stores – the mammoth project has been completed on time (no mean feat considering the scope of the initiative), meaning 861 branches of Tesco across the UK & Ireland now have The Entertainer toy aisles greeting shoppers. It will be very interesting to see how Christmas sales stack up – talking to CEO Andrew Murphy earlier this year, he admitted that 2024 would be very much a learning exercise, with an element of ‘test and refine’ about the overall product mix within Tesco stores. I suspect that this learning process is about to accelerate rather sharply in the coming weeks.
Meanwhile, it has been another record year for the Smyths UK operation, as revenues and operating profits hit new heights – with further expansion hinted at for next year. The company’s gross margin did decrease ever so slightly, which may in part explain Smyths’ focus on increasing its own label and own brand ranges this year (at least that’s what some suppliers feel has been happening). We’re also delighted to exclusively reveal the Smyths list of Hero Toys for Christmas this morning, ahead of its official unveiling to consumer media on Monday – you can check out what has made the list here.
Talking to one of the most experienced PR people in the toy market earlier this week, she mentioned that consumer media take-up of the Christmas lists released so far this year has been lukewarm – which certainly hasn’t been a bad thing for Toy World’s online traffic numbers, as we regularly come out top of google searches for Christmas top toy lists. It may also be a good thing for DreamToys: one of the risks of going later is the possibility of ‘list fatigue’ setting in amongst consumer journalists. Some years, if the nationals and other media outlets have already covered several individual retailers’ lists, they may feel the subject has run its course. As there has been minimal Christmas top toy coverage so far, that may play in DreamToys’ favour. I do wonder if some of the lists were released a little too early this year, as I have seen little coverage of Christmas in general in the media just yet.
However, DreamToys will have to contend with the possibility of a tube strike happening on the day of the event, as will the Fence Club AGM a few days later– some of us will certainly be getting our step counts up that week, unless the strikes are called off. If you are planning to come to London for either event, I would allow a little extra time to get to where you need to go – thankfully DreamToys is easily walkable from Euston and Kings Cross, which is just as well as tube strike days tend to gridlock central London.
Looking ahead to Toy Fair Season, I was talking to Stuart Whitehill – who organizes the British Pavilion in Nuremberg – earlier this week, and he mentioned that they are now down to the final couple of available spaces for 2025. I find the Pavilion to be a really good way for companies to exhibit in Nuremberg: much of the ‘grunt work’ of stand construction is done by Stuart and his team, which is a huge advantage at such a busy time for the toy community. There is also a wonderful camaraderie amongst the companies on the Pavilion, and it certainly attracts visitors from across the globe. So, if you are a British Toy / Educational company and you’d like a presence on the British Pavilion in Nuremberg at the end of January, you should get in touch with Stuart very soon – stuart@overseasfairs.co.uk.
Read the rest here.
