Industry leaders, retailers, and manufacturers weigh in on toy trends, changes, and more in The Toy Book’s annual State of the Industry Q&A.
DARRYL LI, Director or Marketing, Jada Toys
How do you integrate pop culture licenses into your products?
In an ongoing effort to stay ahead, Jada looked to bring its core competencies in die-cast to the figure category, which resulted in Hollywood Rides. Hollywood Rides captures the essence of Hollywood’s most iconic vehicles and delivers them as die-cast collectibles with the iconic Jada style. From authentic movie vehicles to inspired-by executions, Jada delivers fan-favorite franchises across pop culture. By keeping our finger on the pulse of pop culture, we never miss our mark when it comes to delivering what the consumer is looking for. Hollywood Rides allows us to keep things fresh and exciting by giving consumers a nostalgic blast from the past or delivering modern iconic vehicles that have graced the big screen.
Our Nano Metalfigs line opened the gate for us to create a vast library of the most popular characters from the most popular brands. These figures come in a 1.65-inch size made in a 100 percent die-cast metal execution that features authentic character likeness. Having this in our library led to us working with major entertainment properties, which laid the perfect foundation for us to grow Hollywood Rides.
Recreating iconic vehicles and figures hasn’t been the only feat that Jada has to showcase. As we began to search for a greater challenge in pushing this brand, we came up with something truly special. One of the most innovative avenues that Hollywood Rides allowed us to go down is the creation of inspired-by vehicles.
The team at Jada continued to show how infinite their creativity was by taking some of the most prominent superheroes and imagining what vehicles these characters would drive if they had a real life car. For example, our DC Comics Bombshells line takes the most popular super heroines in a 1940s-era pinup style and pairs them with a sweet classic ride in a livery that we think would perfectly compliment them as characters. To date, these are some of the most innovative and well-designed castings in our library.
Another example that has brought us fantastic acclaim is our Marvel inspired-by executions. We paired fan-favorite characters, such as Deadpool, Iron Man, Spider-Man, and Black Panther, with an existing vehicle that we redesigned to match them. When you see the character standing next to their own unique vehicle, you can’t help but think to yourself, “This is the perfect car for this superhero!”
