Richard Gottlieb’s family and close friend and colleague, Steve Abdo, established a grant at the University of Richmond, along with The Toy Association in Richard Gottlieb’s name to carry on his legacy. The first recipients came to the NY Toy Fair 2025 for the weekend on March 1, 2025.
Steve Abdo, a manufacturer’s representative and long-time friend and colleague of Richard Gottlieb’s, arranged for the 8 students to meet with some of his clients: Best Ride On Cars, Nikok and Explore Scientific to learn about their businesses.
The students attended The Toy Association Trends Briefing and Global Toy News set up a seminar for them with Chris Byrne, The Toy Guy, who spoke about how he landed in the toy business, having started as an aspiring actor and now being a speaker and frequent tv personality in the toy world, author, theatre critic, podcast host for The Playground Podcast and the Editor of Global Toy News. Steve Velte, Global Toy Experts, talked about mergers and acquisitions in the toy business and the details, timing and steps on the investment side. Joe Farco, a Copyright and Patent lawyer, spoke about what was involved in getting a toy licensed and protected, as well as what it was like being a toy inventor.
The eight students, four boys and four girls, were Sophomores, Juniors, and Seniors majoring in Cognitive Science, Computer Science, Pre-Business, Accounting-Finance, Business Administration-Marketing, and Anthropology. They were articulate, engaged, and all full of insightful questions, and one of the girls even gave us her resume!!
We can’t wait to do this again next year when the NY Toy Fair will open on February 14, 2026.
Undoubtedly, Richard Gottlieb was smiling as he watched these very bright and motivated students hearing about his beloved field of the business of toys and play and hoping that they too would find the joy and the purpose of this amazing business like he did. This business took him worldwide to speak at toy fairs in Germany and China, among other places, inspired him to found Global Toy News and enriched his life enormously. And it all started with his stellar education at The University of Richmond.
