L Is For Lego, Leapfrog, L.O.L. Surprise! & Lincoln Logs – A To Z Of The Toy Business
LEGO
Lego is arguably the most iconic toy brand, played with and enjoyed by many generations. Playing with Lego has been proven to advance the capabilities and skills required for STEM careers, and as such millions of engineers and scientists owe part of their success to having played with Lego when they were young. Lego is both the biggest toy company in the world (by $sales) and the biggest toy brand. The entirety of their just under $7billion USD revenues derive from the Lego brand. There is no other brand which comes close to achieving this level of revenue from one brand.
Lego as a company first began way back in 1932 when Danish carpenter Ole Kirk Christiansen started making wooden toys. The earliest forerunner of the now iconic and ubiquitous Lego brick came to market in 1949. Lego today trades around the world, dominating the Construction toy category in nearly every market. The company also has hundreds of retail stores selling their products. The latest plans from the company suggest growth to around 800 retail stores in the short term.
LEAPFROG
Leapfrog has been a market leader in electronic learning toys since back in the 1990s. when co-founder Michael Wood found it hard to teach his son to read and developed a prototype for what would become Leapfrog’s ‘Phonics Desk’ product. After battling with VTECH to lead the kids educational tablet device market, Leapfrog was eventually acquired by VTECH for a reported $72m USD.
LOL SURPRISE!
L.O.L. Surprise! Has been a sales juggernaut since launch back in December 2016. The brand was launched on the back of the massive unboxing trend but has since extended into a full Doll & consumer product licensing brand. There have been very few toys over time which have launched and hit No. 1 best selling toy and then stayed in the market with further brand extensions. We expect L.O.L. Surprise! To be a long-term perennial brand going forward.
LINCOLN LOGS
Lincoln Logs is an iconic construction toy which was first invented around 1919 and was inducted into the Toy Hall of Fame in the USA back in 1999. According to reports, the inventor, John Lloyd Wright modelled the toys based on a Japanese hotel design for which his own father was the architect. Wright was also influenced by Abraham Lincoln (hence the name!) and the frontier history of the USA.
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