September 3, 2024 | The Toy Foundation’s (TTF) curated online auction is officially open for toy enthusiasts everywhere to place their bids! Featuring one-of-a-kind experiences, valuable brand-building services, unique collectibles, and more, TTF aims to raise $50,000, with all proceeds supporting its work delivering play to children’s hospitals.   Don’t miss out: Bidding is only open through Monday, September 9 at 10:30 p.m. (Pacific). While the auction is part of TTF’s “Party with a Purpose” fundraiser, you don’t need to attend to make a difference. Click here to create an account or sign into an existing one to participate.   Auction items include: Pop Culture Collectibles for a variety of fandoms, including DC Comics, Marvel, Star Wars, Squishmallows, and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles C-Suite Experiences, including private meetings with industry leaders and HQ visits Personalized Products & Packages, including custom-built advertising campaigns, private portrait sessions, and an autographed vinyl from Blues Traveler Family-Fun Packages, including theme park excursions, private parties, and must-have products Getaway Excursions, including golf, boating, performances, and private dining   See the full list of auction items online here.   All auction proceeds directly support TTF’s Children’s Hospital Play Grants program. TTF’s fundraising goal of $50,000 will fund two or more grants, which will provide the healing power of play to hospitalized children and families in greatest need. In the program’s four years, nearly 60 grants have been funded to impact 500,000 children and families nationwide.   All toy professionals in LA for fall previews are invited to attend “Party with a Purpose,” taking place September 9 at TAO Los Angeles (secure your ticket here). The event is industry’s night to unite its philanthropy to support more children and families in need. Plus, enjoy an exclusive performance from Blues Traveler, networking with industry leaders, and craft cocktails and food.    “Party with a Purpose” is taking place during The Toy Association’s LA Fall Preview market week (September 9 to 13). Visit toyassociation.org/lafallpreview for more information.   To learn more about The Toy Foundation and get involved, visit ToyFoundation.org or contact TTF staff.

Hey, Chrissy! Thanks for coming to our events every year and congrats on your recent successes! You always seem to be in the center of the fun crowd. So, who in the toy and game industry do you have the most dirt on?   I thought you would never ask. Just kidding, but I am sure I now have every reader at the edge of their seat!   You both license and self-publish games, what makes you crazy enough to do both?    Landing a licensing deal with zero game design experience, on your first and only concept that had never been to market, is like striking gold in this industry. Yet, that is exactly what happened with my first game, Friend or Faux, originally pitched at CHITAG back in 2017. We left armed with feedback, knowledge, and a plan to do a Kickstarter. Less than a year later, we had our final design, a successful Kickstarter, and a couple of interested companies, ultimately landing with Goliath. I was bit by the inventor bug. I created more games to pitch and quickly realized the odds of getting a game licensed are slim. My ego got the best of me and said, “time to do this ourselves!” So, there I was now with just a smidgen of industry knowledge thinking, how hard can this be? The answer? Hard, very hard.    Even though you self-publish, you still pitch ideas for licensing?   My brain is always working on new ideas and at this stage in my business, there is not enough time or money to do them all on my own. So, I pitch my ideas to other companies, in hopes they will bring them to life for me.    Do you enjoy pitching? Do you prefer in person or virtual?    After failing miserably pitching to a major retailer for the first time, I knew exactly why, I wasn’t true to myself. This might sound strange, but I was trying too hard to look and sound professional. I had to throw that experience away and learn to just be myself. The more I pitched, the better I got, and found using humor helps me set a tone as well as set me at ease. I have grown to really enjoy pitching. It is a bit of a game in itself, sometimes you win, often you don’t. Thankfully, I am not a sore loser! In person pitching vs. virtual pitching is like reading the book vs watching the movie. In person is always better!   What do you feel has been your greatest “win” so far working in games and toys?   From a licensing perspective, it is the deal I landed with Mattel following last year’s POP pitch event. If you would have told me they were going to be the partners in my game ‘Girls in Bar Bathrooms’ now selling in Walmart, I would not have believed you. Turns out, when in doubt, pitch! You never truly know what a company needs and assuming you do could cost you a great opportunity! I was lucky to have a friend and fellow inventor, Jillian Lakritz, encourage me to pitch this out of the box concept to the company I expected to have the least interest. I owe her a lot of credit!      From a self-publishing perspective, I have landed all three of my self-published games in stores like Barnes and Noble, Toys r’ Us, and Books a Million. In the chaos of owning and running a small business, I have to remind myself of these wins. Hard work really does pay off!   What do you like best about working in the game and toy industry?   Everyone thinks my job is cool, ha! I have also met other creative, interesting people along the way, that have become friends, support systems, and idea partners. There is no lack of talent in the game and toy biz!   Any advice for those getting started?   I still consider myself somewhat new, but if I think about what has gotten me to this point, I would say to take the leap and put yourself out there! No good idea gets noticed sitting in a closet, in a notepad, or as a thought in your head. If you really want to be in this industry, immerse yourself in it and learn what you can, It will only make you and your ideas better. As the old saying goes, luck is when preparation meets opportunity!  

Parallels in Play: The Puppy Zone When I saw Nancy Zweir’s recent post* on LinkedIn about keeping play as an integral part of an adult life recently, I couldn’t resist commenting that fostering a puppy is a great one. It also happens to be my current front-burner method for knocking adult-me out of lax improvisational habits – and into the unavoidable chaotic joy of keeping a frenetic, playful office mate in-home. In fact, being a mother in toy design with a strong life-long affinity for animals – it’s been clear to me for ages that the parallels between child raising (from a behavioral standpoint) and puppy-wrangling are close enough to make puppy practice a valid litmus test for how some people may or may not adapt from 4-legged to 2-legged little rascals. ; D Many, if not most of the same “reward the good/redirect the bad (behavior)” advice applies – and works. And in terms of redirecting – it’s in play that results are quickly and unequivocally established - particularly in puppy engagement. Because nearly everything a puppy does in real time is an accelerated version of human child development. The bond between our species – born of the same mammalian origins and solidified with a unique symbiosis tens of thousands of years old – is clearly at work. But no matter the many fascinating reasons (this is NOT a dissertation LOL); this dynamic is instructive, challenging and undeniably delightful. Especially as applied to creative development. For example; walking a puppy is a metaphor for managed expectations, improv and best practices rolled into one. Struggling with an 8-11 week old Great Pyrenees infant on walks, erroneously attempting to muse on the days priorities, it becomes clear how many parallels there are between creative work flow and the process of wrangling an emerging powerhouse of sentient brains, bone and muscle. And here a few that came to top of mind today: • Daily discipline of getting up and out - no matter how your feel or what the temperature – because baby LOVEs the cold way more than you do and shares none of your preference for warm coffee indoors at 7 am in a Midwestern winter. Here, this puppy is a living avatar of the Rest of the World. Awake and moving with or without you. There is no hiding under the covers now - only cowering while the future howls to be let out of her crate. • Immediate and constant vigilance - that underlies simultaneous physical and cognitive multitasking; watching for hidden triggers (squirrels?!) maintaining a firm grip on control (leash) while performing awkward maintenance (poop patrol) because sudden powerful shifts in priorities are going happen right at the moment you are bent into the least-balanced position, in the attempt to manage an anticipated mess. • Group dynamics that shift from one phase (block) to the next – there’s that big guy who loves to chase his ball. Is he going to share? There’s the little nervous one who wants a piece of the new kid. Can we cope? Who’s that staring at us from across the field? Oh, and here we approach the insane clown posse behind the privacy fence who scare the life out of us on random days with a barrage of bloodcurdling murder barks! Yikes! • Resource management – better pick up the new kid as you see a stranger approaching, or anticipate the posse up ahead. Build in time to allow her to observe, from a safe distance, the many different individuals we meet - and learn by watching what they do as long as she is interested. • Goal setting - that’s not in sight, but within reach (park!) and a pace that allows for exploration (what’s that!?), growth in stamina (cold/wet/windy days) and flexibility (always time for a sniff). Because the race is won in a mode that incorporates random input, course changes and eyes-on-prize at the end of each round (home!). These days, that prize is a tired, napping ball of baby-shark teeth and velvety fluff underfoot as the (pet) toy design day begins! Warm blood flowing to brain, coffee kicking in – and the urge to make something out of half nothing again feels energized and fresh. #woof!