We've spent the past week showing you all of our finds from this year's Toy Fair. From a $10,000 stuffed animal to powder that turns your bath into goo, there are products for everyone. Now it's your turn to tell us what you think of the soon-to-be released products. Take a look at the most buzzed about items and let us know if you are adding them to your shopping list.
Is a company still green, even if it's owned by a mainstream manufacturer? The popularity of eco-friendly toys has given rise to a number of small companies that specialize in natural and recycled goods. Unfortunately, to create such products, some green makers turn to smaller plants to produce their toys, frequently leading to higher prices on the store shelves.
Just this week, Sprig Toys, the company that uses a bio-composite of recycled wood and reclaimed plastic to create their line of battery-free vehicles, announced a merger with WHAM-O, the 60-year-old company behind the Original Frisbee. According to the company, the new partnership will provide Sprig Toys with better access to manufacturing plants, ultimately reducing the price of their environmentally-friendly goods and introducing a line of WHAM-O Jr. products made from Sprig's Sprigwood material.
Such strategic partnerships are nothing new, but they do pose an important question: would you still buy eco-friendly products when they are manufactured by companies that aren't green?
As the 2010 Toy Fair draws to a close, we are left with a deluge of new products that our lil ones will be clamoring for in the coming months. With the nation still recovering from a deep recession, were manufacturers keeping our wallets in mind as they developed the latest batch of toys? Take our quiz and see just how much some of the most buzzed about products will set you back this year.
A convention center filled with 10,000 toys may sound like fun and games, but it was all about business at the American International Toy Fair. Manufacturers count on the event to display their wares and make their way onto the hot toy lists for the coming holiday season. Though retailers are hush-hush about what they are actually ordering, we took a look at what was displayed and are making our predictions as to what will be shelved at popular toy stores.
It's a tough job, but somebody's got to do it. Over the past three days, the nation's leading toy manufacturers, as well as several newcomers, introduced their latest and greatest creations in hopes of becoming the Zhu Zhu Pets of 2010. Through wandering through the 345,000 square feet of exhibit space and eyeing the 7,000 products that were on display for the first time, we identified several trends that you can expect to see on store shelves later this year. Here are the top five toy trends to keep an eye out for as these products hit your local retailer.
Barbie may have a new high-tech career, but Computer Engineer Barbie isn't the only technologically inclined girl on the block. Barbie Video Girl has a video camera built right in! The lens is in her necklace, and video is displayed on an LCD screen on her back. You can also hook Barbie up with a USB cable to a larger screen to get a doll's-eye-view on the world.
Video footage taken with the doll is also able to be uploaded and edited on your computer. Expect the doll to hit stores in July with a $50 price tag.
