Growing in New Directions with Revolutionary Ideas

If you believe a kid is a kid is a kid, you haven’t been around one lately. Kids today are growing up in highly stimulated environments. They’re smart and clever and always looking for the next new thing. At JAKKS, we realize that children will always enjoy a doll, an action figure or a ball. We also recognize that we need to take those toys to a new level to truly engage today’s youth.

That’s why our sports balls are sticky, squishy and fun in durable new materials. It explains why our action figures have skin and limbs that feel real and our marker pens feature not only bright ink, but sparkles as well. These are but a few simple examples of how, throughout JAKKS, our employees are charged with maximizing our offerings—of making sure the long-lasting drivers of our portfolio continue to captivate the most challenging consumers in the world: children.

We’re up to the task. We believe we’ve assembled the most creative, energetic, innovative and just plain fun teams of designers, merchandisers and brand managers in any industry.

Thanks to our acquisition history, our staff can incorporate features from other lines that make sense and exploit a wealth of knowledge and resources from within. Perhaps most important among our assets is our employees’ ability to see and use synergies among divisions. As we grow, we are careful to take advantage of our acquired resources and experienced designers to enhance product lines, while striving to maximize our manufacturing capabilities to enhance products while keeping costs down.

For example, we’ve seen great, sustained success with our Flying Colors reusable compound Nickelodeon Goooze®. The slimy compound has been marketed in numerous formulations, including regular, glow, glitter, metallic, aromatherapy, stinky-scented gross-out formula and more. By sharing ideas and resources among divisions and across product categories, we have utilized the slimy compound to enhance the play-value of other toys. We created a cement dump truck from our Road Champs division with “real” cement; we included neon compounds in some WWE™ playsets to help recreate scenes from programming; and even have a soft-barreled pen line called Goooze FlexOGels™ with the compound inside the barrel.

In a related development, FUNimation recognized our skills in the boys’ action area and challenged our design team to reinvigorate their products for the Dragon Ball franchise. As a result, our new Dragon Ball Z line will feature role-play with lights and sounds, new characters for the action figures, and a playset of the inside of a monster’s body—complete with the goop and slime that the kids see on the show!

Products featured in the Summer section: Psychedelic Butterfly from Go Fly A Kite, Funnoodles, Constroodles™ and Soak-A-Noodles™, Disney Jr. Sports Super Elastic Bubble Bat, Dragon Ball Z® action figure, Nick-tivities Gak Splat™ football, and The Storm™ water guns.