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Toy Fair Day 3: Of Mattel and Mega

A little over a year ago, Mattel was the biggest name in toys. They were sitting comfortably on some of the best-known properties, including Fisher-Price, Barbie, Hot Wheels, and DC, plus had a lock on the collectors' market with titles like Masters of the Universe and Ghostbusters. But LEGO was on a rocket, having just surpassed Mattel's chief rival, Hasbro, and was posting consistently better profits ahead of the February 2014 release of The LEGO Movie. With no in-house brick option (as opposed to Hasbro's Kre-O line), Mattel purchased MEGA Brands, itself one of the ten biggest toy manufacturers.

I have been a fan of MEGA for several years. I've written reviews, visited them at Toy Fair, and just generally enjoyed talking with a group of people who were so genuinely enthusiastic about the products they made. The first representative I spoke to nearly four years ago is still there, and when she was preparing to be out on maternity leave she made sure to let the journalists she was in touch with know who to contact so as to not miss any news (that representative is still with MEGA, too).

My dealings with Mattel have been...different. Every 6-12 months I have to try to figure out who I should contact when my last e-mail bounces back as undeliverable. I have never spoken to the same rep at two consecutive Toy Fairs. Events feel like they were thrown together late, and at nearly all of them I hear the phrase "what's going on?" from other journalists as well as Mattel employees.

Dealing with Mattel has actually become sort of an industry-wide joke. In their entry or last year's Collector Event, CollectionDX subtitled the entry "In Which We Give Up on Mattel," and started the article with, "We've always had a difficult time with MattyCollector at Toy Fair." OAFE.net has pointed out the problems with Mattel time and time again. I've spoken to toy designers, sculptors, and fellow writers who have all shared the same experience.

All this brings me to today.

This morning was Mattel's Mega Bloks Blogger Event, something I only learned about by going up to the Mattel booth on the first day of the show (as no one in charge of organizing the event bothered to communicate with anyone answering e-mails). I was told to be at the Mattel desk at 9, where I and the other writers were checked off a list and issued wristbands. We were then ushered into a room that had several of the upcoming sets assembled and posed on pedestals in front of posters advertising the lines, and left to our own devices. I snapped some pictures, said hello to my Mega rep (who was in attendance, despite no one at Mattel recognizing her name when I asked for her), and was back out on the concourse 15 minutes later.

Compare that to last year, where I made an appointment to visit the booth several weeks ahead of time and was given a half-hour tour that explained the lines, sets, characters, what was good about them, and when to expect to see them in stores. The overall booth was arranged by series, and the displays throughout were nicely done and fun to view. There were interactive displays, packaging samples, and the people working knew exactly what was going on.

I'd say it was merely caused by the difference in company size, except LEGO (the aforementioned largest toy company in the world) was able to answer my e-mails quickly and courteously, and even provided alternatives when their schedule filled up. Sadly, the communication and attitude issues all seem to be on Mattel.

Not the employees, mind you: the people I get to deal with directly are usually great people who are enthusiastic about their work. The problem comes from higher up, somewhere in the machine that is the central workings of Mattel. It's at this level that ennui sets in, communication fails, and things get...well, "Matty'd."

I'm sorry to have seen such a change in the atmosphere of Mega. Their products still look very cool (I'm especially digging their Terminator: Genisys line), but some of the "oomph" has gone out of the people working there. I hope they can find a balance between the company I knew for years and the corporate juggernaut that somehow seems to suck all the fun out of making toys.


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