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Spin Master Games is the No. 3 Games Manufacturer in Annual 2012, according to The NPD Group, and has recently acquired the worldwide rights to Perplexus.
Spin Master will be releasing a slate of new games for fall, including Perplexus Rookie, Perplexus Epic, Boom Boom Balloon, Hedbanz Act Up, and Logo Party.
For more information, visit www.spinmastergames.com.
According to The NPD Group’s Retail Tracking Service report, LeapFrog Enterprises, Inc., a leader in educational entertainment for children, topped the 10 best-selling toys list last year with its award-winning learning solutions. The LeapPad Explorer, LeapPad2, LeapPad2 bundles, and the Leapster Explorer educational software were among the top 10 toys sold in the U.S. Moreover, LeapFrog had three of the top five sellers in the toy industry last year. [Read more...]
MGA Entertainment, the largest privately held U.S. based toy company, posted 41 percent dollar growth in Q3 2012 versus a year-ago, according to The NPD Group.
Within the U.S., retailers continued to see explosive growth with Lalaloopsy, a global toy powerhouse driven by robust product, entertainment, and licensing programs. Interest in the brand continues to develop as seen with the strong sales of Lalaloopsy Silly Hair Star: Harmony B Sharp, the first-ever talking, singing, and dancing Lalaloopsy doll.
This summer, MGA debuted Bratzillaz and Novi Stars. Bratzillaz takes girls’ imagination on a supernatural flight of imagination to reveal their own special powers. Novi Stars combines cosmic adventure with cutting edge toy features never before seen in doll play.
Outside of girls’ toys, broader support for Little Tikes helped drive sales. Little Tikes hottest retail sellers include Little Tikes Pillow Racers and iTikes, a new line of pre-school toys that can be enhanced through the technology of Apple iDevices.
For three weeks in September, The NPD Group fielded results from the unaided, open-ended question, “What would the kids you know say is the hottest new thing these days? It might be a celebrity, movie, TV show, toy, game, hobby, sport, website, brand, or retail store.”
According to Kids and Entertainment Content, 2011 Edition, the latest report from The NPD Group, kids are spending more of their entertainment dollars on digital content compared to last year. For every dollar kids (ages 2 to 14) spend on entertainment content, $0.79 goes to physical content (versus $0.85 in 2009) and $0.21 goes toward digital format content ($0.15 in 2009).
While the majority of kids’ entertainment content is still acquired in a physical format, NPD reports, digitally acquired content has grown substantially over the past two years—a 17 percent increase for games, a 14 percent increase for music, and a 13 percent increase for movies. The study reports that kids start downloading digital content at a young age; approximately 50 percent of kids have paid for their first form of digital content by the age of 7.
Kids are driving household purchases of consumer electronic (CE) devices, according to Kids and Consumer Electronics, 2011 Edition, the latest report The NPD Group.
The report showed that, when looking at devices purchased in the past year, 78 percent of portable video game systems purchased and 56 percent of portable digital media players (PDMP) purchased were given to the child. The report also detailed that 73 percent of kids use computers purchased, 74 percent use televisions, and nearly 60 percent of kids are using a portable or console gaming system.
For households with kids ages 4 to 14, newer devices, such as e-readers and media tablets, were acquired at single-digit rates (8 percent and 5 percent, respectively). The report also notes a slight decline in the average number of days in which kids use cell phones, PDMPs, and portable video game systems since last year. For all other devices, the average number of days has remained stable or declined, suggesting kids are maxed out on time.
Among households with kids ages 4 to 14, many consumers are purchasing CE devices online (for example, 46 percent for e-readers and 31 percent for desktop computers). In comparison, only 9 percent of toys are purchased online for kids in this age group.
Based on its “Global Toy Market Estimates: 2011 Edition,” The NPD Group reported that 2010 global toy sales were $83.3 billion, up nearly 5 percent from 2009. This increase was largely due to the market in Asia, which nearly doubled the world growth rate at a 9.2 percent increase in sales. However, the U.S. continued to top sales in the toy market, at approximately $22 billion. American sales combined with Japan, China, UK, and France sales added up to just over 50 percent of global sales.
Europe suffered a 4 percent drop in sales from 2007 to 2010, partially due to fluctuating exchange rates. The emerging BRIC toy markets (Brazil, Russia, India, and China) reported a growth of 13 percent. The NPD Group expects a continuing positive trend this year, although not as dramatic as previous years. NPD also predicts a rebound in European sales.
According to a new report by The NPD Group, Kids Leisure Time IV, as kids get older they socialize with others in different ways, replacing person-to-person communication with other forms of socialization, such as social networks, cell phones, and video chats, which may be considered another form of entertainment. According to the report, kids ages 2 to 4 spent 17.5 hours per week spending actual face time with friends or siblings, with the average hours per week dropping off as they aged (10.8 hours for ages 9 to 12).
While kids have the same number of hours to spend on leisure time (68 leisure hours in a typical week), they have more activities that they are engaging in, requiring them to reprioritize how they spend their time, reported NPD.
Although kids may be engaging in more activities, and have new forms of entertainment, NPD says this has minimal impact on kids’ interaction with toys; unlike movies, kids are still as actively engaged with toys as they were in the past few years. NPD reports that kids may even be spending slightly more hours per week with toys than they did in 2009.
Marshall Cohen, chief industry analyst of The NPD Group, initially expected that the holiday 2010 season would “be remembered as a good year, not a great one.”
“To be great,” said Cohen right before Christmas, “the consumer would have to be in a frenzy and retailers would still be stocked with plenty of product to go around.” According to Cohen, retailers practiced the theory that it is better to sell out than to have leftovers.
On Monday, Cohen revised his outlook saying: “Holiday 2010 just went from a truly Merry Christmas for retailers to a lost weekend with retailers scrambling to recover lost sales.” Cohen called the post-Christmas weekend “brutal,” citing an already shortened post-holiday shopping weekend due to the holiday falling on a Saturday and the Sunday snowstorm in the Midwest and Northeast.
“All-in-all retailers will lose about 0.5 [percent] of sales with the loss of this big post-Christmas day. And by the time they make it up, the sales will fall out of the range of the ‘holiday numbers,’” Cohen said. “Consumers will now have to wait longer to use those gift cards and make their returns. This is an important part of the sales in that consumers tend to spend approximately an additional 16 percent above the face value of gift cards and returns.”
COMMENTARY: Disney’s Monsters U Sure to Scare Up Sales
Disney is really good at a lot of things. One of those things is taking a beloved property and refreshing it, breathing new life into it, and turning it into a must-see movie or must-have property for a new audience of kids. They do it every year with Disney Princess (Last year was Cinderella, this year is The Little Mermaid). The film comes out of the vault, and the already incredible powerhouse that is Disney Princess (the No. 1 toy property ranked by annual 2012 dollar volume according to The NPD Group), launches an expanded program of licensed products focused on the Princess of the year.
However, Disney works some its best magic on the big screen, and Monsters University—due in theaters June 21—has success written all over it. Billed as a prequel to 2001′s Monsters Inc., the film follows fan favorites Sulley and Mike on their journey to becoming scaring professionals at Monsters University. (If you’re interested in attending, visit http://monstersuniversity.com/edu/.) [Read more...]