By Isaac Elliott-Fisher, Film Producer and Owner of Village Toy Castle
Can toy advertising inspire interest in play? Can it teach game patterns? Can it enrich childhood through creative inspiration? Or is this just crass commercialism aimed at parents’ wallets?
These questions have been at the forefront of my mind for nearly 15 years as a documentary filmmaker exploring the history of iconic toy brands and franchises. During the COVID-19 pandemic, I began collecting interviews with industry professionals, experts, psychologists, and historians to explore the psychology, evolution, and history of toys, games, and the subtle art of marketing to children. I seek to understand how and why changes in media, new product development, and consumption affect the overall quality of children.
I began exploring this topic a few years ago as I watched my children grow from toddlers to preschoolers and elementary school-aged children exploring their world through play. In retail, we’ve ended up in a wasteland of empty shelves, toys for adult collectors (or “kids”), and addictive screens.
modern childhood
After World War II, the introduction of cheaper materials such as plastic and television marketing reshaped the toy industry. Television turns children into advocates who can drive purchases based on their parents’ needs. These wishes angered some and led to restrictions on marketing toys to children.
In the 1980s, President Ronald Reagan deregulated the FCC, opening the door for toy companies to fund 30-minute animated commercials that were often considered cartoons. Brands like Masters of the Universe, Transformers, Strawberry Shortcake and GI Joe led a revolution that spawned a wave of action figures, vehicles and playsets over the next decade, all of which were supported by shows, movies and support from publishing projects that embrace licensing and transform brands into franchises.
Control kills creativity; policy kills play
One might say that this fervor of free market capitalism creates a rich environment for creativity and storytelling through competition. However, critics argue that mass consumerism is dangerous for children, leading them to imitate what they see on television, while ignoring the endless magic children create off-screen using corporate storytelling as a starting point worlds, each driven by imaginative gameplay.
Through interviews, I discovered that the nature of toy companies employing animation studios is to maintain distance, and animation studios in turn employ freelance writers and artists. Their motivation is not to produce toy advertisements, but to create a rich and timeless story through the production of art. The setting of the story. Eventually, the lobbyists prevailed, and the new regulations went into effect in the 1990s.
Where creativity and collaboration once existed, toymakers have created silos where they have their own artists and writers and can control their output internally.
“All the streamers and studios are now being cautious about children’s animated content and copying each other,” said Ciro Nieli, animation director and producer and showrunner on the 2012 Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles reboot. ) said. “The last thing they want to do is make a show about warriors.”
broken market
While many people like to blame electronics and technology as the culprits of the KGOY (Kids Getting Older Young) phenomenon, it’s been happening since the arrival of the first video game console and computer tsunami in the ’80s. Children’s attention is increasingly precious, and while I believe screens can take some of the blame, it’s time to take a hard look at the products on the desktop and their marketing (or lack thereof).
As the owner of a small destination toy store in rural Ontario, Canada, I do my best to stock a variety of products targeted at children ages 5-10. Every year it becomes more and more difficult to find new, unique and exciting products for children (especially boys) in the range. I find it nearly impossible to find action toys that aren’t just old, recycled brands that the kids’ dad played with decades ago. In many cases, these brands are now being repurposed for adult collectors to reconnect with their childhood heroes.
Since the huge success of Spin Master PAW Patrol More than a decade ago, there was a habit of diluting popular IPs by reshaping them for younger audiences. In my research, I discovered that animation studios no longer discuss the totemic nature of design—instead, they are now looking for ways to relegate every stale IP to the preschool space in a now-ubiquitous form factor. Children often don’t miss preschool brands, but they remember what they liked in elementary school.
Children ages 5 and older no longer have a common monocultural avenue of exploration. They don’t entertain themselves briefly in front of the TV before venturing out. These collective experiences give children a common language of play that becomes a “water cooler” topic of discussion on the playground. Toy sales are driven by children’s collective awareness of culture, storytelling, experiences and creativity.
storm of complacency
Many children today are not allowed to play outside. Unlike their parents and grandparents, they don’t walk to their neighbors’ houses with action figure suitcases, blow up GI Joe in the backyard or garden, dig sewers for the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles or fly X-wings through hedges . Instead, modern parents have the profoundly misguided notion that the real world is dangerous and that we should keep our children at home, tethered to small internet-connected screens, to keep them busy and protect them from danger. In effect, we give them the equivalent of a highly addictive dopamine machine with little regard for the effects on children’s brain development.
Play researcher Dr. Kathy Hirsh-Pasek is a strong advocate for the critical importance of screen-free, imaginative play for children. “If you really want to create future CEOs rather than worker bees, let children play, discover and develop the real skills they need for the modern world,” she said.
Meanwhile, parents looking for action toys for their 5- to 10-year-olds are surprised to find that the industry has aged into preschoolers or adults, with little in the way of middle ground.
“When it comes to the phenomenon of children growing up faster, toy companies seem to have accepted that for a while,” said Tom Kalinske, the former Mattel CEO who later led Sega’s fight with Nintendo. The struggle. He noted that the industry appears to be doing a better job of responding to market shifts.
Create new narratives
As parents, we are hijacked by the media we consume. We must work extra hard to manage our fears and emotions while curating content for our children in a world that doesn’t require them to discover anything on their own. This is where I’m personally confused.
My middle son discovered the world of Godzilla through the YouTube algorithm, but his mode of play was not a game, but a demonstration. He set up dozens of Godzilla action figures in static displays, something he learned from watching the mindless “content” adults do for a living on YouTube. He found something to want to play with, but the prescribed format didn’t enrich the narrative and didn’t have the same safeguards and regulations as television.
Children are still children, biologically they have not changed. They still need to play with their hands, outside, in the dirt, under the couch, on the floor. The tools they use to do this can be homemade, found, or purchased, but there’s nothing wrong with providing options they can discover, work with, and enjoy.
We live in a business-driven world and children are part of it. Whoever cracks the code and provides them with new, creative, and exciting options will make serious money while convincing kids to put down their screens. Who will create the next iconic brand before it’s too late?
A version of this feature was originally published in The Toy Book’s 2024 Action & Adventure Special Issue. click here Read the full article! Want to receive a printed copy of The Toy Book? click here Subscription options!
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