City, state offer incentives to Little Tikes
Hudson Hub-Times
MGA Entertainment, parent company of Little Tikes, was awarded a state tax credit June 29 to expand operations in Hudson. Tom Richmond, general manager of ...

Hasbro profits rise as Transformers leads fight
Times Online
Mattel did, however, get a boost last year from movie-related toys, including Batman, Kung Fu Panda and High School Musical. The company did not give any ...

Voice of 'SpongeBob' surprised at show's success
Times Herald-Record
But Kenny — who also voices the controversial Skids robot in the 'Transformers' movie sequel and a talking toy chain saw under development by Fisher-Price ...

Toy time at the Museum Center
Cincinnati Enquirer, OH -

What better way to celebrate the season for playthings than to visit the Toys Through Time exhibit in the John A. Ruthven Exhibition Gallery at the Cincinnati Museum Center? And, it's free.
Highlights include original 'Star Wars' toys and their prototypes made during the 1970s and '80s by the former Kenner Co. of Cincinnati.
Also on exhibit are ice skates from the 1840s and a first-edition Monopoly set with sterling silver game pieces. Dolls, trains, books, blocks, building and mechanical toys, puzzles and sports equipment also are displayed.

Barbie dolls up in amchi Dollywood
Economic Times, India -
MUMBAI: For over five decades, she has been a fixture in toy stores. Soon, she turned a fashion icon offering young girls tips on hairstyles, makeup and dressing up in gowns.

But did you know that Barbie Millicent Roberts from Willows comes shopping for clothes to suburban Mumbai? The dresses and tresses that make Barbie, the world’s most famous doll, a global fashionista are from a nondescript firm in Sewree.

Jayant Parekh, the promoter of Fancy Fittings, has been stitching clothes for Barbie for about four years now. He also makes her hair, combs, mirrors and shoes; all this away from public glare. The dresses for the first Barbie-born in 1959-were handstitched by Japanese homeworkers for their finery.

But the doll’s maker, Mattel, now prefers to pick the stuff from small units in China and India, as they come cheaper. Many of the partywear and cocktailwear that Barbie stacks in her wardrobe are sourced from the Sewree workshop.

And Mr Parekh has been making the best of it. Exports of assembled Barbie dolls and Barbie products are helping him notch up Rs 40 crore annually. He is now dolling up his firm for PE infusion.

Barbie uses more than 105 million yards of fabric and more than a billion pair of shoes every year. Fancy Fittings is one of the companies, but the only one in India, to produce these accessories.

“Mattel has outsourced a part of the production of the doll’s accessories to us. We export her dresses, shoes and hair for use in other markets. We also assemble the dolls meant for the Indian market and pack them,” says Mr Parekh.

Mattel India MD Sanjay Luthra says, “We have been associated with Fancy for sometime now and we are extremely happy with the quality of the stuff they make for us. Small companies, which follow the best practices, will continue to get business from us.” The company also manufactures and assembles moulded toys for Barbie products.

The Devil’s Playthings

It’s toxic, all right.

I don’t have the space to account for all the pathos and pathology at Toys R Us. (And, in fairness, much the same would apply to the toy sections of big-box retailers such as Wal-Mart and Target.) Nor do I have room to bemoan the fire hose of marketing pressure turned on children to get them to buy into franchises, everything from Spider-Man to Hannah Montana, whoever she is. A lot of writers have covered this ground, anyway. Of recent note is Benjamin Barber’s scholarly if distempered “Consumed,” which describes how advertisers lay siege to young people to create a lifelong dependency on consumption. To me, the money quote comes from R. Buckminster Fuller: “Those who play with the devil’s toys will be brought by degrees to wield his sword.” Typically at this time of year, retailing experts offer their lists of hot toys for the season. Among the buy-early favorites for 2007 are Webkinz, stuffed animals that come with fluffy avatars in an online Webkinz virtual world—dry sand for emotionally thirsty children. And so, in honor of the first day of orgiastic holiday shopping this Friday, I thought I’d offer my own list of the most awful, creepy and child-nullifying products for sale this year. Or, in Fuller’s happy phrase, the devil’s toys. Please enjoy.

Monopoly Electronic Banking Edition: Instead of the traditional pastel currency, this edition of the Parker Bros. game uses debit cards and a swipe-here card reader, the better to inculcate bitty buyers into the effortlessness of impulsive buying. The tokens also have been updated to depict a Segway personal transporter and a flat-screen TV, among other items. The charming and evocative top hat and iron have thus been exchanged for the contents of K-Fed’s storage unit.

Play Along’s Tattoo Doodle Monster: Play Along has a large line of stuffed animals that children can decorate with washable pens. The Tattoo Doodle Monster includes temporary tattoos and various stencils for children to use on themselves. “Hey Dude, I’m Inkee,” the box says. This is a great toy if you want your 4-year-old to grow up to be Tommy Lee.

Tiger Electronics’ Dream Life:Absolutely the saddest thing in the store. The tag line for this TV plug-in game is “Create the Life You Dream About.” In the game, the player (either a girl or a fairly confused boy) begins a new school year: “Bad hair day? Swing by the salon & try out a new hairstyle. . . . Make lots of friends—joina sports team—or just hang out . . . it’s all in your hands.” I can’t help thinking about the poor kid who’s drawn to this game, frantically flipping buttons in the vain hope it will reunite her divorced parents.

Planet Toys’ CSI: Forensic Lab: Join Grissom’s crew! Ages 10-plus. Sweet, suffering Jesuits. First of all, if you are allowing your 10-year-old to watch “CSI,” you should be reported to the authorities. Second, do you really want your middle-schooler dusting for prints or learning to run a black light over your upholstery? I do appreciate that this toy hearkens back to a time when apprenticeship toys—chemistry and Erector sets and build-a-radio kits—tempted young minds with careers as chemists and engineers. But really, forensic technician? How long before you discover grandpa sleeping in a recliner, surrounded by crime scene tape? Obvious brand extension: CSI Special Victims Unit Rape Kit.

Fisher-Price Star Station: Baby karaoke. Say no more.

Phthalate monster is science-phthiction
Los Angeles Times, CA -
A bill is heading for Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's desk that calls for banning certain substances that are used to make vinyl toys and child-care articles soft and flexible. The bill, AB 1108, is loudly and vigorously supported by pressure groups that feel these articles present a possible health hazard. The bill has no basis in solid scientific research. It creates a mythical monster and asks the governor to slay it with a stroke of his pen. It should be vetoed.

The bill touches an issue on which we all agree — the health and safety of our children. State and federal governments have spent billions of dollars creating health and regulatory systems to protect their citizens from harm — California is second to none in its commitment to health and environmental safety. This bill circumvented all those safety systems. In fact, it ignored them. Its passage ignored the findings of exhaustive risk assessments performed in the United States and in Europe. Now it threatens to short-circuit a promising state effort to reduce hazardous waste and toxic threats called the California Green Chemistry Initiative, an innovative venture with which our industry hopes to cooperate.

The issue revolves around a particular chemical, called di-isononyl phthalate (DINP), which is the primary softener used in vinyl toys. The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, or CPSP, spent more than four years studying DINP and found 'no demonstrated health risk' to children and 'no justification' for banning it. The European Union's Chemicals Bureau also spent years conducting a risk assessment, reviewing 257 published and peer-reviewed scientific articles, before finding DINP 'unlikely to pose a risk for consumers (adults, infants and newborns).' The European Union findings were published in 2006. The CPSC findings were reaffirmed in a letter to a state senator just in July. What, one can fairly ask, is the issue?

It is not for industry to say what motives are behind the assault. But we do strongly object to gross overstatements and the perpetuation of urban legends about these and other chemicals, all apparently designed to sow fear and uncertainty among consumers and product manufacturers. To say, as Karp and Gibson said in their Op-Ed, that this chemical can be sucked out of a vinyl toy like the flavor out of bubble gum is grossly wrong and far beyond the bounds of reason. And to use political pressure to push this bill through the Assembly, where it was first defeated, and then through the Senate, may be impressive politics, but it is not good science.