Advance word on this year's Toy Fair, which starts Sunday in New York for some 20,000 buyers and sellers in the $22 billion industry, is that price matters. In an interview with MarketWatch, Hasbro CEO Brian Goldner said the company would be "dialing back" on some of its pricier toys in light of the recession and emphasized that most of its products retail for $20 or less. This doesn't include its Transformers line, based on kids' movies, which has roughly $500 million in annual sales.
Will one of the prominent players in today's dialing-back economy, Bernard Madoff, be on display at Toy Fair? Two months after Madoff was arrested and allegedly admitted to a decades-long Ponzi scheme that has liabilities of roughly $50 billion, HeroBuilders.com is selling the Bernie Madoff action figure, complete with a fistful of cash, for $149.95. Yes, of course there's a Rod Blogojevich figure, too. Same price.
If all this makes you want to snap your wallet shut, may I suggest Good Times Made Simple: The Lost Art of Fun and Tips for Parenting in a Consumer Culture, free booklets from the New American Dream organization. They may be the antidote for kids of all ages who are attracted to action figures of all kinds.
1 comment:
Price is the key at this year's gem show too, which was featured in a good piece on NPR yesterday morning (2/17). Those HeroBuilders figures are kind of scary! Each of them looks like a body builder. Weird.
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