Our Playing At Business podcast has been going since 2018, making it one of the first podcasts focused on the toy & games business. We cover all kinds of topics related to our industry on the podcast. To find the full episode list, just click here
Here's some specific episodes which are among the most listened to:
EP 78, CONSUMER PLAYTESTING: THE SECRET WEAPON OF SUCCESSFUL TOY & GAMES COMPANIES
Toy & games companies generally don't test their products enough with consumers. We all know how much testing goes into ensuring products are compliant with safety standards, but what about testing to see if they are compliant with functionality, fun and general appeal to kids & their parents?
Consumer research playtesting is the not so secret, but shamefully under-utilised weapon of toy & game companies. All the major global toy companies have extensive consumer research programs, but as we discuss in this podcast, research doesn't necessarily have to be expensive to be useful.
EP 72, HOW TO FIND & VALIDATE GOOD TOY FACTORIES
Toy companies (both big & small) rely heavily on the factories they work with. Every time they produce a toy your reputation and potentially your business rest on the factory & their complying with safety, ethical and quality standards. Competitive pricing is also a concern of course, manufacturing spend is the biggest cost for toy & game companies, so comparatively small savings in percentage terms can add to up to significant money.
In Episode 72 of the PLAYING AT BUSINESS podcast we take a look at how to find and then validate good reliable toy factories. We have worked with many different factories in different factories over the years, and we have introduced more than 100 toy & game companies to new factories. The things we learnt during this process are shared in this podcast.
EP 71, THE INEVITABLE RISE OF INDIA AS A TOY MANUFACTURING HUB
The toy business is moving from a single hub (China) sourcing model to a multi-hub model. India is the only other country with comparable population size, with abundant cheap production line labour and existing industrial capacity and domain expertise in plastics. There are many more reasons though why India's rise in toy manufacturing is an inevitability.
The current manufacturing solutions in India are not perfect, but as the toy business begins to clamour for ever more production capacity outside of China, only India has the potential to scale up capacity to levels like we have seen develop in China over the last 30 years or so.
More on all this in Episode 71 of the Playing At Business podcast.
EP 68, UNDERSTANDING THE TOY MARKET IN FRANCE WITH YANN FRESNEL
France is one of Europe's 'BIG 3' toy & game markets. In this episode we speak to Yann Fresnel (of Toy Influence), who has extensive commercial experience in the French toy market. We discuss his career in toys, what companies need to understand about the market in France and also look at how his company helps with market entry in 'La Republique francaise'.
This episode contains a lot of very useful and insightful information - for example we discuss how the Games category accounts for nearly one fifth of the entire toy market in France. For more key information and tips on how to get ahead in the toy market in France, listen to this episode now!
Comments