The LA Fall Toy Previews are underway, and almost 300 toy and recreation producers wish to meet with members of the worldwide retail neighborhood within the better Los Angeles space.
UK-based Addo Play first took area within the rising El Segundo Toy District final yr with a short lived area throughout the April previews. By September 2023, the corporate established a U.S.-based subsidiary, Addo Play USA LLC. It secured a everlasting showroom at 1960 E. Grand Avenue, the situation affectionately dubbed “The New Toy Constructing” as a nod to the previous Toy Heart in New York Metropolis.
This yr, Addo Play is rolling full steam forward to develop its enterprise within the U.S. Addo Play Co-Founders and CEOs Mary Value and David Martin are eager to fulfill with potential retail companions seeking to develop their companies by way of a sturdy line of merchandise throughout an in depth vary of inside the Addo and Early Studying Centre manufacturers.
The Toy Ebook: Might you give us just a little backstory about Addo Play’s historical past for these unfamiliar together with your firm and merchandise.
Addo Play: Based in 2015, Addo Play is an award-winning, dynamic toy firm providing any retailer a “able to go” multicategory toy alternative. By means of our Addo and Early Studying Centre manufacturers and evergreen licenses, we offer complete toy options, capsule ranges, and particular person objects for retailers and different strategic companions, relying on their wants.
Addo Play is easy {and professional} and provides the very best blue-chip service. Our crew of world consultants in product growth and toy sourcing creates excellent toys by way of clever, caring, and secure designs which are uniquely tooled.
Our toys’ exclusivity, differentiation, excessive gross sales velocity, and excessive retailer margin units us aside. Our elevated and coherent ranges are based mostly on retail gross sales information and insights, so we all know what works.
This data, mixed with our exclusivity in our companions’ market, means retailers can management retail costs and margins and supply a differentiated toy providing in comparison with their competitors — an unbeatable mixture.
TB: Your non-public label manufacturers are largely new to North America — Are you able to inform us about every of them?
AP: Addo and Early Studying Centre are complementary, elevated private-label toy manufacturers, every with its personal distinct persona.
Addo is our on a regular basis toy model that gives excellent worth. It’s a real various to main manufacturers.
Early Studying Centre (ELC) is our globally trusted, one-stop store for high-quality, timeless preschool toys. With over 50 years of experience, ELC supplies a guiding hand to help each youngster’s distinctive path of growth and encourage studying by way of play.
Our manufacturers are contemporary, up-to-date, and aligned with right now’s customers. We’ve got grown our toy portfolio to greater than 1,000 merchandise, together with Addo, ELC, and, in recent times, a number of evergreen licenses.
By means of these licensing partnerships, we provide excessive margins and factors of distinction on powerhouse manufacturers like PAW Patrol and Barbie. One other instance is our unimaginable success with Spin Grasp’s distinctive Fugglers property. We reinvented the model, repositioned the worth to be a real worth, and made it accessible as collectibles, leading to phenomenal world retail gross sales. We nurtured this model and handed the torch to ZURU Toys, which has taken over world Fuggler plush toy licensing rights from Addo Play.
TB: Why ought to retailers inventory ELC in a aggressive preschool area?
AP: ELC’s timeless toys final for generations and have introduced pleasure to youngsters and households by way of studying and growth for greater than 50 years.
We acquired ELC in 2019 because of its uniquely designed, high-quality, sturdy, and reasonably priced toys. This world-class, heritage preschool toy model supplies a guiding hand to help each growth path, encouraging studying by way of play.
ELC is an entire and unmatched resolution for retailers. It delivers distinctive merchandise with a complete vary that encourage creativeness and spark studying by way of play. Our merchandise are reasonably priced for households and offered at nice margins by our retail companions.
TB: When you’re on the lookout for U.S. retail companions, how is Addo Play’s worldwide footprint?
AP: Greater than 24,000 shops promote our toys by way of a global community of strategic companions and distributors. They’re accessible in varied retail channels, together with unbiased specialty toy shops, grocers, shops, mass retailers, hypermarkets, e-commerce platforms, and comfort shops.
We promote to companions in Canada, South America, Europe, the Center East, Asia, and Australia. Some key retailers embrace The Entertainer Toy Store, Tesco, Marks & Spencer (M&S), and Toys “R” Us Canada.
We’re very excited to make waves within the U.S. market as we construct our manufacturers right here.
TB: You talked about The Entertainer Toy Store, which is acquainted to our readers and buddies within the UK however not well-known right here within the States. Are you able to elaborate on the connection? There’s a compelling alternative for the same partnership with the correct occasion within the U.S.
AP: By means of its Unique Partnership Program, Addo Play features as The Entertainer Group’s product growth and toy manufacturing division. Addo Play Ltd. is a part of TEAL Group Holdings, the dad or mum firm that owns all working corporations inside The Entertainer Group.
The Entertainer is the fastest-growing toy retailer in Europe, working greater than 350 Toy specialty shops within the UK, the Republic of Eire, and worldwide markets by way of its franchise companions. The Entertainer additionally companions with Tesco, M&S, and Matalan to assist run their toy departments. This relationship locations Addo Play toys in additional than 4,000 shops within the UK alone.
Earlier this yr, The Entertainer and Tesco introduced a partnership to promote toys in additional than 850 Tesco shops throughout the UK and Eire. Because the UK’s No. 1 retailer and third largest worldwide, tons of of hundreds of Tesco clients can take pleasure in on a regular basis entry to unique Addo and ELC merchandise.
As a sister firm to The Entertainer, Addo Play’s product assortment is data-driven, utilizing greater than 40 years of specialty toy perception and a window into all the most recent traits. All merchandise adjust to all related QA moral and security requirements, which is advantageous to potential worldwide clients because the merchandise are able to go together with no capital funding from the accomplice.
TB: Inform us a bit about how enterprise ethics are important to your sustainability technique.
AP: We’re dedicated to creating the planet a greater place for each youngster, future generations, and the worldwide communities we work with. Our technique goals to ship this dedication by way of sustainable product and packaging design, accountable enterprise operations, moral buying and selling ideas, neighborhood focus, and a caring, various, and inclusive organizational tradition.
Addo Play works to exceed moral expectations and security requirements by way of ground-up design. 100% of our large-scale manufacturing base was independently audited in alignment with globally acknowledged requirements and certification packages, comparable to SMETA, BSCI, and the ICTI Moral Toy Program.
Our crew of compliance professionals has intensive toy business experience and ensures that every one our toys meet worldwide high quality and security requirements for markets around the globe. In addition they work within the U.S. and are conversant with CTPAT commerce compliance.
Guided by our core values, we consistently problem ourselves to seek out extra clever enterprise methods — methods which are optimistic and assist society construct a safer, extra sustainable world for generations of kids to return.
TB: How can retailers and distributors greatest have interaction with Addo Play?
AP: We’re glad to attach! events can e-mail gross sales@addoplay.com to guide a gathering.
The Toy Ebook crew can be on the bottom in Los Angeles for the LA Fall Preview Market Week, September 9-13, 2024. The Toy Ebook’s LA Fall Toy Preview Difficulty debuts Sept. 9 and might be picked up at The Toy Affiliation’s area in El Segundo and the lounges at 1960 on Grand and OPEN.
