Episode #113: 10 Unexpected Toy or Game Ideas That Will Inspire You To Make Your Ideas Real
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Does this sound like you? You have a life outside the toy industry, but you have ideas. Maybe you are a lawyer, a baker, or even a mechanical engineer. But there’s something from your daily life or playtime with your family that has inspired an idea for a toy or game. How do you take that from inspiration to product?
In today’s episode, I share stories from my students who took their products from idea to reality with the help of The Toy Creators Academy. Learn how a developmental child psychologist, a TV producer, and a “dragon lady,” all conceptualized, developed, and pitched products that stemmed from an idea from their daily life. I hope this episode will inspire you to get that idea you have in your notes app into the real world.
After 11 years in the Toy Industry and working with more than 100 students as The Toy Coach, I’ve seen so many different kinds of people turn their background or expertise into a toy or game. Listen to this episode to find out what kinds of ideas have worked and why, and hear a few inspiring stories of toy industry success.
EPISODE CLIFF NOTES
Learn the inspiration behind the early childhood education toy line, Ruby Rae Society [00:05:09]
Find out how an illustrator student of mine went from creating IP products like characters to designing mechanical products. [00:07:58]
Learn which stores a student got her products placed in after doing a mini-pitch at the TCA Pitch Event. [00:12:59]
Learn how experience in other industries can translate to the toy industry. [00:14:20]
Find out how you can create a product even if you never have before. [00:17:01]
Learn how it’s possible to focus on one specific product and find success. [00:20:34]
Learn how just walking into a store can help sell your product. [00:23:10]
Find out how one student used qualities from her cultural upbringing to create a unique product. [00:24:31]
Find out how one of my students turned a fun idea between friends into a licensed game. [00:25:36]
Learn ideas for everyday activities that could be turned into a toy or game. [00:29:32]
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This episode is brought to you by www.thetoycoach.com
To check out Trudy’s ideas click the link www.rubyraesociety.com
To check out Karen's illustration work, head over to www.karencraigart.com/clients/craigk/nav/splash.shtml
To check out Carla and her beautiful work Dragon Lady Art, click the link dragonladyart.com/
Connect with Emmanuel on LinkedIn
Check out Julie's ideas by clicking the link dealinginfeelings.com/
To check out Jeff’s ideas visit www.marmals.com/
To check out Kristen’s Mini Mail head over to www.minimail.com
Check out Naana’s ideas by clicking nabinarva.com
Check out Chrissy ideas by clicking the link eaptoyandgames.com
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[00:00:00] Azhelle Wade: You are listening to making it in the toy industry episode number 113.
[00:00:05] Hey there toy people Azhelle Wade here and welcome back to another episode of the toy coach podcast, making it in the toy industry. This is a weekly podcast brought to you by thetoycoach.com. Tell me something, do you have a unique skill? A professional technique you use or expertise that you could turn into a toy or a game? You know what I bet you do. I know what you're thinking. Oh, Azhelle I? I mean, yeah. I guess I do have something, but I can never turn that into a toy. I mean, I could never develop that game. But hang on before you talk yourself out of it. Why are you so quick to turn away from what could be a great toy or game idea? Why do you want to tuck that toy or game idea into the deep recesses of your notes app to never see again? Why not develop it.
[00:01:15] Imagine this, you develop your toy idea and you actually get it into the hands of people that want it the most. Whether you do that by going the entrepreneur route on your own, or you pitch it to toy manufacturers who do the heavy lifting of the manufacturing for you. Or maybe you make that toy game idea real with the help of a distributor. Why not take that therapy method that you built for your practice or that play pattern that your daughter made up last week or that game that your family accidentally made up on vacation and turned it into a real product? Why not take a chance and realize those toy dreams of yours? Now I want to make sure of something. I want to make sure that you understand that you have something super special. You are a person who is inspired and enamored by the toy industry, but you also have a full life outside of the wonderful world of toys and games.
[00:02:21] Now that life that you have outside the toy industry could be anything. You could be anything from a full time mechanical engineer to a baker. You might be an artist, an author, a teacher, a lawyer, an animator, or even a software developer. And there is a chance that doing your nine to five every day job, that you've likely discovered a new way to play or a new way to learn through play that most people working in the toy industry haven't thought of just yet, or at least have an executed. What I'm trying to make you realize is that you have a unique toy or game idea within you based off of all of your existing, personal, and professional experiences. And today I'm going to help you identify just what those ideas are. After 11 years working in the toy industry, developing product and after working with almost a hundred aspiring toy and game creators as a coach I've seen so many unexpected professions and passions translated into the toy world, which let's be honest, that should happen.
[00:03:39] I always say there's no better way than to find inspiration for your next big toy idea than to look outside of the toy industry. I've seen amazing toy and game ideas designed to help kids sleep better, reduce anxiety, promote diversity, or just encourage silly family fun. I've even seen clever modern adult recreations of classic games like Candyland and monopoly. Play is a form of expression and it's a great way that kids and adults learn. So why shouldn't there be a way to play or a specific toy for every profession, personality, disability, or passion that's out there. And why can't you, my friend be the one to create that new way to play that new toy play thing. But at the end of today's episode, my goal is to have your mind flowing with toy and game ideas that you would truly be passionate about creating. I'm going to share some examples from my amazing students and podcast listeners to get your creativity flowing. And we're going to talk about all of these amazing toy and game ideas and why they worked. Then we're going to wrap up with a little bit of a teaser for next week's episode and of course your action item.
[00:05:09] Let's dive in and talk about my toy entrepreneurs, student Trudy Badu. Trudy created a brand called Ruby Ray society. A toy brand that is diversifying early childhood education. One product at a time. The goal of Ruby Ray is to create a world where underrepresented kids see themselves positively represented everywhere, especially in gifts and games. Now this idea came to Trudy when she noticed that a lack of representation was negatively affecting how the kids close to her in her personal life saw themselves and imagined their futures. That's why with Ruby Ray, she offers product that build confidence with parenting resources and learning games that encourage underrepresented kids to love the skin they're in and reinforce empathy and awareness among friends and classmates. Her brand encourages curiosity by making it accessible for conscious parents to explore BiPAP and world cultures, stem and art with their kids. Trudy wants to help parents raise self-aware and courageous kids with strong charitable spirits through her product.
[00:06:34] And when you go on her website and you see what her customers have said, you know, she's doing her job, right? Wait until you hear what Trudy's customers had to say about her product. Quote, I've never seen this range of representation for black girls in any children's learning game. My daughter immediately recognized the beauty complimenting hairstyles, similar to her own, and quote. Trudy really answered her calling by building this brand by recognizing a very specific need and a world after witnessing the negative effects of a lack of representation and creating a product to fill that lack or as we call it in the toy industry, white space. Trudy's brand helps underrepresented girls dream big and helps increase pride and appreciation of BiPAP cultures, hairstyles, and skin tones. You can check out Ruby Rae society online, the links to all of the wonderful students and listeners I'm going to share today will be in today's episode show notes. So head over to thetoycoach.com/113 to grab all of the links to the amazing toy and game products we're going to talk about today.
[00:07:58] Next, I want to talk about my inventor student Karen Craig. Karen has been developing toy ideas for years, but Karen's inventions have always been focused more on developing unique IP properties over mechanical inventions or material inventions. That means Karen was always focusing on characters and designs and illustration styles. Now because Karen is an inventor. I can't share details about what she's working on, but what I can tell you is how far she's come and how quickly. Karen's incredible ability to sketch and draw out her ideas made her stand out at all of the pitch events that she attended, because if she can think it up, she can make you see it with colorful, lively sketches and illustrations. After pitching her IP concepts to toy companies at events like the TCA virtual pitch event. Karen got positive feedback and started to form relationships with some major toy companies. And through those meetings, Karen gained a better idea of what these toy companies needed her brain to be working on.
[00:09:23] So she started trying her hand at inventing more patentable IP products, which means she started inventing toy ideas with unique mechanisms and functions and play patterns that could be protected under the U S patent law for a utility patent. Now Karen started pitching these patentable ideas. And now today she's working with a toy company to develop one of her concepts further. And hopefully we'll be seeing it on shelves and maybe add a toy trade show this time next year. To check out Karen's incredible illustration work, head over to thetoycoach.com/113 we're putting all of the links there. What I love about Karen story is that she came into the toy world specifically in toy creators academy being heavily focused, and unamortized with illustration, she has got incredible illustration skills. So it's only natural that all of the lessons she learned going through TCA she applied it to creating character designs, creating worlds.
[00:10:40] But over time, getting to know all of these companies and seeing what they liked and what they needed and what they wanted to see more of Karen was able to flip the switch and apply her creativity to more three dimensional inventions that would utilize unique combinations of materials and unique mechanisms. So that she could create more than just IPS and characters, but also tangible patentable products. So I have to say, if you are somebody who's always been focused on illustration and you think, you know, I could never invent physical 3d product or mechanism that a toy company would want to patent. I really want to challenge you to just spend time getting to know just one toy company, go on their website, get to know their product, look them up online, read news articles about them. What are they interested in seeing more of?
[00:11:42] And I bet if you give yourself the time to really brainstorm, the time to take apart existing toys in your house and put them together in new ways, what they call kit bashing in the industry, you might surprise yourself. You might be able to come up with a potentially patentable innovation that doesn't exist just yet. Okay. Next, I want to tell you about my student, Carla Morrow. You are going to love this story, especially if you are someone who likes to walk to the beat of their own drum. Someone who just really isn't into following trends, just because they're trends, you know, and instead you do what you love. And that's because Carla Morrow is an artist known as the dragon lady. After a few years of doing art shows, everyone started just calling her the dragon lady. So she embraced it. And at a time when fairies or just increasingly popular and she was being pressured to make fairy art work. Carla instead dug her heels deep into the dragon world and drew a dragon with a ferry in its mouth.
[00:12:59] That tongue in cheek approach to a trend that she just really didn't want to do helped skyrocket her career even more as an artist since then, Carla turned her dragon artwork into plush toys that are sold at gift stores and most recently we're placed in a learning express store in lake Zurich. That all happened thanks to the TCA virtual pitch event. If you want to learn more about that pitch event, head over to toycreatorsacademy.com to learn more. So if you, my friend have an idea for a toy that isn't exactly on trend, or if you're an artist that's just known for a theme that maybe isn't all the rage right now. I don't want you to give up on it. And I don't want you to think that it could never be a popular toy today. Instead, dig your heels in and commit to what you love to do and what you do the best. You may find yourself in a meeting with a retailer who shockingly says, you know what? I don't think I have any dragon items in my store. Maybe we should try one because that my friends is what happened to Carla.
[00:14:20] One of my students, Emmanuel Davis, a software developer, and now toy inventor who said, quote, I write code and I love it, and quote. That is not someone that you would expect to want to jump into the toy world, is it? As the head of technology, Emmanuel has much experience developing software and building massive technology teams, but eventually he started his own consultancy and he found he had the time to work on some of his own ideas. One of which was a toy idea. Today Emmanuel has grown as toy company contact list and gain interest in his project. At this stage emmanuel's project is top secret, but what we do know is a company is interested in its innovation and currently reviewing it with their internal teams to determine exactly where and how it could possibly fit their line. What Emanuel shows us is even a career in an industry that normally we see as competition for the toy industry. That experience and knowledge of software and digital goods can actually be a huge benefit to a company looking to expand their product line into different areas.
[00:15:50] Moving on. Let's talk about Julie Dini. Julie is an educational developmental child psychologist based in Australia who often works with children who have developmental disabilities. Julie has always used a lot of toys and games and books in therapy to engage with the kids in her sessions. But she couldn't find the therapy tools that she really needed to help her kids identify emotions in themselves and others. She found products that were tailored to adults, but not for kids. So she made her own and luckily she had the light bulb idea that she might not be the only one who would benefit from a product like this. Julie's dealing in feelings cards, each feature, a kid showing a different emotion with a different bright background. And luckily Julie had the foresight that she should make a product that's more than just a flashcard set to identify emotions.
[00:17:01] So she included a double set of emotion cards, meaning there's two of every card in her deck. With this addition, her product has so much more playability. The cards can be used to play matching games, old maid, and even go fish. Julie now sells dealing in feelings online to help kids and families around the world. When Julie first started selling this product, she was making just one to two units a day, but by 2021, that number increased to a hundred units per day. Now, if you're thinking, oh, I could never do that. Where would I start? I just want to let you know that Julie had never created a product before. She had no idea how to do graphic design, but she found a graphic designer online and found support in the community of other students inside toy creators academy. And just a quick reminder, we will include all of the links to these incredible products in the show notes, head over to thetoycoach.com/113 to grab the links.
[00:18:12] Next up. I want to share this story of a podcast listener who has been listening into this podcast since the early early days. Jeff Lawber is an industrial designer who does contract work inside and outside the toy industry with companies like Starbucks and under Armour. And through his work as an industrial designer, he became connected with the toy industry and manufacturing partners. Then Jeff came up with the idea for Marmals, a customizable fidget toy that is an amazing outlet for creativity. Marmals are all white vinyl characters with limbs and body parts that pop on it of through a patented magnet system. Marmals encourage creativity because of how you can pose and mix and match the Marmals body parts in silly ways, but also how you can decorate the Marmal with included washable markers.
[00:19:13] Jeff ordered his first batch of marmals just before the pandemic. And they got caught up in the shipping hold caused by the pandemic back in 2020. But once his product arrived, Jeff didn't waste any time he hit all the virtual toys shows and the in-person trade shows like Astra camp and the in-person show. And he sold hundreds of his marmals into various toy stores. Jeff's toy, in my opinion, has this beautiful designer feel, but it has that mass market accessibility as far as play pattern and price point, but they are still a product you'll want to collect, decorate and show off. You can find Jeff's marmals for sale on his website and at over two dozen stores all across the United States. Now Jeff story is one of an industrial designer who took the leap to create a product using all of the skills, knowledge, and connections he already had established throughout his career, but there's still so much to be learned. Isn't there, they're still marketing your product and attending toy trade shows and taking orders and shipping goods and all of that.
[00:20:34] And Jeff's story is a true Testament to how it's possible to focus on one specific product and create a large statement and get into numerous stores. The next product I want to share with you is from another listener, Kristen Gunn, a Texas based TV producer, who is the creator of mini mailboxes. Now mini mailboxes are cute vinyl mailboxes that you can use to send tiny notes to your friends and family. What I love is where Kristen got this idea. It's a true family business. Kristen credits the idea for mini mailboxes to her stepmom, Trish, who handmade mini mailboxes for her dad, in which she would give him little edible treats, like rice Krispies treats and little things to just say, I love you. One day Kristen said to her step-mom Trish, this is a real idea. This needs to be a real thing. And that's when she made a test model in polymer clay, and eventually manufactured mini mailboxes overseas.
[00:21:50] Now her mini mailboxes come with little mini envelops and I love that. Don't you love how a simple gesture that one of your loved ones is doing out of the kindness of their heart can ultimately be an amazing product idea, or maybe just inspire an amazing product idea. Kristen's step-mom had no intention of creating a full product. She wasn't thinking of it like that. But what things do you do in your everyday life that you don't even think are that special things that you create or you build, or you give to your loved ones that could potentially be a pretty great toy idea. Now mini mailboxes come with little mini envelopes, mini letters and small foan treats. There's all different themes and colors of mini mailboxes that you can get. Even I have one. The name of Kristen's business is mini mail. And today it's a family run business. The mailbox design itself is a custom hand sculpted design and every piece of mini mail or packages that you can put into these mailbox, which you can buy are still made by hand with love.
[00:23:10] Kristen has gotten her mini mailboxes placed into a toy store in her hometown just by walking in with her product and having a conversation with the manager. But if you're not Texas-based and you still want to own a mini mail, you can just purchase them at her store online. The links to mini mail will also be in today's show notes. Okay. Next, I want to introduce you to Naana Amissah. Naana is a children's author, doll creator, and speaker who created a line of dolls based on her culture. The dolls are called Ewuraba, which means perfect lady. These are dolls from Ghana. And following cultural traditions each doll has a sole name reflective of the day of the week. Naana created the dolls using authentic fabrics from her hometown for fun at first, but then quickly ordered additional dolls and fabric as her friends and family loved them. And she decided to build out the idea. You too, might have something special from your cultural upbringing, from your family history that could translate into an incredible idea for a toy.
[00:24:31] Take it from Naana who applied a cultural tradition to the names of her dolls, giving them such a deeper significance and roots in her heritage. Now, the last student I want to talk about today is Chrissy Fagerholt. Chrissy is a full-time mom and game designer who accidentally came up with her first party game ever while she was having a fun night out with her girlfriends. Chrissy and her friends went in on that first game venture together and licensed the game Friend or Faux with Goliath games. Friend or Faux is the game of ridiculously revealing questions. It started as a fun idea between friends and turned into a tequila infused. After the rush of making and licensing her first game ever, Chrissy realized that she had found her passion and her gift. While her friends weren't interested in making game invention, a full-time gig of their own Chrissy was, and that's why she joined toy creator's academy.
[00:25:36] Today Chrissy says her passion and drive to be part of the game and toy industry is something she found late in life, but it's her life experiences that have lent themselves to the strong and creative ideas that she develops. In just over a year I've got to say Chrissy has become known in the game and toy industry as a clever inventor with on-trend concepts and super entertaining sizzle videos that are sure to make you laugh. If you want to arrange a meeting with Chrissy because you want to see those hilarious sizzle videos and really well thought out family and party games, then head over to the show notes thetoycoach.com/113, and I'll link you to her inventor studio, easily amused productions. Now, before I jump into my summary of today's episode, I've got to give a massive shout out to Rick Derr of learning express lake Zurich. So today Rick posted the best video to the toy coach podcast Facebook community, and he showcased two toy creators academy students products that arrived at his store. He is doing a test run of these products. I am so excited for these students.
[00:27:02] Thank you Richard for supporting the students of toy creators academy for supporting toy creators academy itself. And I hope that we continue to impress you and bring incredible products and innovations to the toy industry. Your contributions do not go unappreciated. They need to be shouted from the rooftops. So that's what we're doing here today. Okay. So I hope that by now you've been inspired by the stories of different toy and game invention products that I shared with you here today. And maybe you're getting some ideas of what family experiences or professional skills that you might have, that you can turn into a really fun or unique toy or game idea. And I hope you've also learned here today that there are a variety of paths that you can take to get your idea out into the world. If you've ever thought that your industry, your professional industry was just too far away from the toy industry, that it just didn't make any sense for you to try to make a toy.
[00:28:16] I want you to think about Kristen, the TV producer or Julie, the child psychologist. And think about how those people so far away from what is the toy industry could take their knowledge or their life experiences and translate them into toys. And look, I just scratched the surface today. Toy people. There are other amazing students of toy creators academy, and other listeners of this podcast that we didn't cover here today, like Kieche O'Connell, the chemist who came up with an incredible IP property utilizing her science background. Or Pearly Tasker, the baker from Netflix's Dumbo's just desserts who created a toy brand that would help soothe children's anxiety through baking. Both Kieche and Pearly have created children's characters and product concepts around their professional careers and those careers as a baker and as a chemist are certainly far removed from the toy industry, but I'll tell you what they made for some of the most memorable toy products I've seen in a long time.
[00:29:32] Now until we meet again next week. I want you to think about this. When was the last time that you engaged in a form of play? Whether it was learning play or just for good fun, and you weren't using a packaged and sold or manufactured toy product for that play process. What were you doing? Were you teaching someone something in an interesting way using things you built from around your house? Were you cleaning your house in a fun and entertaining way? Were you painting or drawing a character for someone that you loved? Thinking about the last time that we engaged in play or felt that sense of play is a great way to identify potential toy and game ideas that are already happening within our everyday life. I know by now you must have at least one toy or game idea that popped into your head. But we don't just want any toy idea. We don't just want any game idea. I want you to think through moments of play and come up with a toy or game idea that you can be passionate about this year into the next.
[00:30:48] Because while making toys are fun, it's not easy. So we want to make sure that whatever idea you choose to run with is one that you truly, truly love. And one that really lights you up. You may have noticed as we went through some of the toy ideas today. I mentioned that some of these students and listeners were entrepreneurs selling their product to retail stores. And I mentioned that other students were working with companies to potentially license their ideas. And if you're curious what all that means, or if you're curious where you might best fit in. I have a really fun quiz that you can take to help you figure out just that. All you have to do is head over to thetoycoach.com/quiz and you can take the what type of toy creator are you quiz. You might be a toy inventor, a toy entrepreneur, or a corporate toy person. And of course, once you take that quiz and find out which type of toy creator you are, you are going to get sent to a podcast episode that will teach you all about that particular toy path.
[00:32:01] As always thank you so much for spending this time with me today. I know your time is valuable and that there are a ton of podcasts out there. So it means the world to me that you tune into this one. Until next week, I'll see you later toy people.
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🎓Learn more about how you can develop and pitch your toy idea with Toy Creators Academy® by clicking here to visit toycreatorsacademy.com and join the waitlist.
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