ATTENDEE GUIDE - Toy Industry Association

28 FEbRuARY 13-16, 2011 | NEw YORk cITY
An Outcome in Question
-Tim Walsh, Inventor and Film Maker
Being an independent toy
and game inventor is
not for the thin skinned.
Rejection is a part of the process
of taking an idea from prototype
to pitch to potential product. Toy
and game inventors know that
for every
successfully
l i c e n s e d
p r o d u c t
they have,
there are
dozens (ormore
likely
hundreds)
that never
Tim Walsh
see the light
of play.
Toy Fair is where dreams are
made and crushed. Name a hit
toy or game and it debuted at Toy
Fair. The show has been running
for over 100 years and so there’s a
gravitas to it that makes it a hard
place to make it. Many independent
toy and game inventors
come to ToyFair with their “it”
to pitch to the product acquisition
executives at toy and game
companies.
There are many hurdles from
there. First the person in charge
of product acquisition has to like
it. If so, it goes to the toy company
where the sales department has
to like it. If so, it goes to costing
and the number-crunchers have
to like it. If so, it goes back to Toy
Fair where the buyers have to like
it. If so, it goes on the shelf where
the consumer (often a parent)
has to like it. If so, they buy it and
then finally, the kid it’s intended
for has to like it. If so, the sky is
the limit.
Of course at any point in
the above process, it can be
squashed. It then goes away or it
heads back to the drawing board.
This is the fun and the chase of
trying to make it in the toy trade.
In game parlance, it’s a roll of the
dice. The outcome in question is
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and enforced by Seven Towns Ltd.
www.ToyFairNY.com
a beautiful mystery.
When documentary film director
Ken Sons contacted me about
turning my book Timeless Toys
into a movie about toy inventors,
I jumped at the chance to
be involved. Since I
had met and interviewed
many toy
and game inventors,
Ken brought
me on as Creative
Consultant on
a film we called
Toyland: Fun in
the Making. I
got to go along
to the shoots
and interview
inventors and
d e v e l o p e r s
like Eddy Goldfarb (Kerplunk
and Yakity-Yak Talking Teeth),
Betty James (Slinky), Reyn Guyer
(Twister and Nerf), Burt Meyer
(Lite Brite and Rock ’Em Sock
’Em Robots) and Milt Levine (Ant
Farm). As an inventor, I relished
the chance to fly to Chicago and
see inside Big Monster Toys, one
of the most prolific toy design
firms in the world. I was excited
to peek inside the Toy Design
Department of Otis College of
Art and Design in Los Angeles. I
was thrilled to interview my heroes
on the topic of designing
toys. I was comfortable behind
the camera...until I wasn’t.
About a year or so into the film,
Ken and I realized we had a problem.
The film became predictable
as we told the story of one legendary
inventor after another. Since
all the toys we covered were huge
successes, the outcome of each
Save the planet!
Use Toy Fair Mobile
at the show!
vignette ended the same way: A
hugely popular plaything with its
proud designer. What we needed,
Ken concluded, was an outcome
in question. We needed to give
the viewers of the film a compelling
reason to
keep watching to
see how a story
was going to end.
And so I became
the toy inventor in
front of the camera
whose toy story was
unknown. It’s not
such a comfortable
place.
Toyland is a look
inside the fiercely
competitive, 22-billion
dollar toy
indus- try, with me asthe
poster boy for rejection. It’s risky
to put yourself out there for all
to see, when the risk of failure is
more likely than success. In the
film, we trace my toy idea from
mere concept through the development
stage and then the pitch
process, with 2 1/2 years and 8
rejections along the way.
How does the film end? Well,
just like pitching a toy or game
idea, the only way to resolve an
outcome in question is to go
along for the ride.
Tim Walsh is the inventor of the
game Blurt! Toyland: Fun in the
Making won Best Documentary
awards at the Naperville
Independent Film Festival and
the Independents’ Film Festival.
This March it will screen in Paris
at the The European Independent
Film Festival. Follow the fun at
www.toylandmovie.com. n