Is 'kidulting' the next big thing for the toy industry?

[00:00:00] Speaker 1: all right well if you're an adult who loves toys there's nothing to be ashamed of you're just one of many millions of kidults the american toy association says 58 percent of adults bought a toy for themselves last year alone on tiktok videos of adults doing just that have more than four billion views marissa silva is the pop insider editor-in-chief she joins us now nice to see you marissa we're not talking about barbie dolls per se which we might in a moment but what are adults buying when it comes to toys and why yeah absolutely you know adults are not only [00:00:41] Marissa Silva: just buying toys that are typically designed for kids they're actually buying toys designed for them so toy manufacturers are really aware of this trend and they're actually cranking out new products that have adults in mind take for example lego is making lego sets that are designed for 18 plus so they're really more intricate toys they're highly collectible they have great quality and they're [00:01:08] Speaker 3: really made for grown-ups and i will say the nostalgia aspect of a lot of these toys is just delicious we know that there's an et board game that was one of my favorite things that i saw was coming out tell us more about that and really that crossover between the movie and the board games and what that brings [00:01:24] Marissa Silva: to the table yeah you know there's always been a really strong relationship between franchises movies video games things like that and physical products right so you want to recreate those experiences that that you have watching one of your favorite films with a physical item and nostalgia is really playing into this because you know all those films that we grew up with et back to the future star wars you name it they're getting these amazing licensing lines full of collectibles toys games and i love this because it's really allowing adults to connect with their kids in new ways so even if like maybe they don't get the movie as much as we do as much as we love it they're going to enjoy spending that time together as a family maybe enjoying a board game marissa quantified this for us this trend here [00:02:13] Speaker 4: because when you take a look at how much some of these cost you brought up legos before the botanical garden that we were showing that cost just around fifty dollars much more expensive than what i will be spending on legos for my two-year-old so how big of an opportunity is this for some of these larger names [00:02:29] Marissa Silva: yeah for sure i mean we're not talking about a 1999 collectible action figure necessarily we're more talking about like a mitsaki masters of the universe skeletor artistic figure that costs upward of four hundred dollars so there are a lot of these really high-end collectibles hasbro's really known for this with their black series lightsabers those go for about 250 dollars and the quality kind of speaks for itself these are not necessarily things that you're going to want your kids your nieces and nephews playing with you're going to want to take them and display them high up on a beautiful shelf somewhere [00:03:08] Speaker 1: i'll tell you what go into the harry potter store in new york at any time of day and it's at least 50 adults if not higher what do you think facilitated this trend and are we seeing these toy companies actually market toward adults yeah for sure i mean listen the world is a scary [00:03:24] Marissa Silva: stressful place right now and i think as adults we're all just kind of looking for ways to disconnect from the noise and have some fun frivolous like relaxation time and toys and games and play can be a really great outlet for that when you just need to take a beat take a break from all the the craziness going on in the world and yeah manufacturers are super aware that this is a thing that adults are buying toys for them and they're definitely taking advantage by carving out some room within their product lines to create things that are just for grown-ups and how have you seen that change over the last few [00:04:04] Speaker 3: years obviously with the pandemic people were home you know they wanted things to engage in and then in terms of whether they're willing to pay these kinds of price tags if you think my goodness what if my eight-year-old decides to play with the lightsaber i'd be in tears having if i paid you know thousands [00:04:19] Marissa Silva: of dollars yeah you know collecting is addicting so basically what we saw in the pandemic is that suddenly there was a lot of room in the budget right we weren't going out to eat we weren't going to concerts we weren't absorbing entertainment in some of those traditional ways and we were stuck at home looking for ways to engage with our friends whether virtually or spend time together as a family or even just unplugged by ourselves and like enjoy a puzzle um or a lego set so i think that habits die hard and then once you start to get into some of these things you realize how much you love them and they're here to stay so i think that this trend is definitely going to stick around and this is going to be something that we see even more of moving forward marissa before your segment we were talking [00:05:01] Speaker 4: about wordle the new york times teaming up with hasbro to make wordle which is played on the phone into a board game from your expertise just the games that have been successful in the past is that going to translate do you think this will be a hot ticket item over the next couple of months heading [00:05:16] Marissa Silva: in to that very important holiday season yeah absolutely there are 15 toy experts on my team at the toy insider and as soon as we saw this news today we were all freaking out i think that everyone who's a fan of wordle is going to be really excited by this physical adaptation that adds a new layer of competitiveness into it because you can in real time brag to everyone about how great you are at world without waiting for those likes to roll in on social media just amazing i have yahtzee and a [00:05:45] Speaker 1: number of board games that became apps and now we're doing it in reverse got to come full circle too we talked about barbie on the way in and now the barbie movie is being made and the mattel ceo says it will be a quote cultural event why do you think yeah i really have to agree with him just based [00:06:05] Marissa Silva: on what we're seeing with how excited fans are every time a photo from the set is released i mean literally they put out these photos of margot robbie and ryan gosling wearing uh roller skates and like neon outfits and like those things were were trending in search terms through the room people were already saying where can i buy that where can i get that outfit so i think that this film is going to be definitely a blockbuster hit and it's going to be one that everyone's flocking to the movie theaters [00:06:36] Speaker 4: to go see next july you know marissa you're kind of selling me on it i was a little i wasn't too excited about the movie maybe i need to reconsider i don't know we'll see we're going all right we could go we'll do a field trip all right marissa silva thanks so much for joining us