It stands 4 feet high, looks like a squat monkey with a giant head and doubles as a chalkboard that can be drawn on and wiped clean. And it costs $5,000.
Is it a toy, or is it art?
Even the toy industry is split. The statue, known as Monsta Munny, is part of a growing category of collectible figures called designer toys. Kidrobot, the statue’s maker, leans toward calling them art, while its leading competitor, Funko, sees them more as toys.
No matter how such designer toys are labelled, consumer demand has made the sector a booming business. Sales of all collectible toys — a category that also includes action figures, miniature figures and trading cards — surged 33 per cent in 2016, according to the NPD Group. That has helped the toy industry’s overall sales rise 5 per cent last year.
Designer toys, whether oversized or pocket-sized, are typically made from materials like resin, vinyl or wood. Some are original designs by urban artists, but most have pop-culture roots, which has led to brisk business for the figures at fan conventions like Comic-Con International and at speciality shops where they are sold.
The entertainment industry has been quick to license characters for designer toys to promote movies, TV series and video games.
Larger figures are produced in limited editions, making them highly valuable to collectors. Smaller toys are often sold in blind packaging, similar to trading cards, giving the buyers an extra thrill of mystery. That has led to a trend called unboxing, in which excited fans open an entire case all at once in the hope of getting a rare figure and posting the frenzy on YouTube.
Kidrobot is considered a pioneer in the field, having brought designer toys to the US from Japan in 2002. But it has been overshadowed by Funko, a fast-growing toy company that started out making bobbleheads in 1998 and wound up dominating the market for collectible toys.
Both companies make similar products, sometimes of the same character, like Batman, Bugs Bunny or Homer Simpson. But they have different business strategies, and neither thinks of the other as a rival.
Frank Kozik, the chief creative officer at Kidrobot, said he was grateful for the growth and attention that Funko has brought to the industry. “Funko has done the genre a huge favour,” he said. “Through their success, they opened the world to us.”
When Kozik came aboard at Kidrobot in 2014, the company was struggling with financial and leadership woes. The toymaker had stumbled after its founder and chief executive left in 2012. Without strong direction, sales were slumping, morale was suffering and employees were jumping ship.
“The company had lost its way,” said Kozik, who had been designing toys for Kidrobot before being hired by its new owner, a toy company called the National Entertainment Collectibles Association. Kozik aimed to lead Kidrobot back to its roots by working with young, urban artists to make designer toys with a whimsical edge.
Up-and-coming names like Tara McPherson, Amanda Visell and Nathan Jurevicius began customising a prototype that Kidrobot calls a Dunny, street slang for “devil bunny”, creating a new work of art at an affordable price. (The Munny, on the other hand, is customised by the buyer.)
The Dunny concept has been used by other companies like Funko, Medicom, Tokidoki and Disney, which uses a Mickey Mouse form as its prototype for a line called Vinylmation.
But the real coup for Kidrobot came after the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts agreed to give the company a license. To Kozik, who grew up in a punk rock scene, the pop artist was a natural fit.
“Warhol is an amazing artist, and he used industrial technique to popularise his work,” Kozik said. “We do the same thing.”
Its first line of Warhol Dunnys had been “very well received” by retailers and collectors, said Allen Richardson, vice-president for product and marketing at Kidrobot.
The success encouraged Kidrobot to broaden the line to include plush figures, Campbell’s Soup cans that contain mystery figures, and a higher-end reproduction of a Warhol artwork called “Invisible Sculpture”.
Kidrobot also puts its own twist on characters from Marvel and DC properties, as well as TV shows like “South Park” and “The Simpsons”. The mix of artistic and licensed properties helped Kidrobot turn profitable six months ago, Kozik said.
Kidrobot still faces challenges. Its biggest risk will be a property of its own called Yummy World, a child-friendly line that it is developing for mass-market retailers, which means a greater investment and more inventory for Kidrobot.
Yummy World plush toys, key chains and other products are available now, and Kozik said Kidrobot was exploring the possibility of housewares and lifestyle products. “They are visually appealing and they have a tactile comfort, too, like cuddling a kitten,” he said.
Funko, on the other hand, has fewer risks because it focuses primarily on licensed products, which tend to sell better at mass retailers. According to Brian Mariotti, the company’s chief executive, Funko typically handles 175 to 200 licenses at any given time.
It prides itself on its awareness of entertainment blockbusters, making toys on a wide range of well-known properties like “Game of Thrones”, “Harry Potter,” “League of Legends” and “Star Wars”, and even a few unusual ones like “The Golden Girls” and Hanna-Barbera cartoons.
That large portfolio of licenses is a crucial factor in Funko’s growth. The company said it posted $400 million in revenue in 2016, 50 per cent higher than in the previous year.
“Most major toy companies make a big investment in six or seven licenses,” Mariotti said. “At Funko, we are not going to have to worry about the constrictions that bigger companies have.”
Funko has few worries about being squeezed by larger toymakers. Remaining agile helps it stay competitive, Silver said. “If you look at the cost of manufacturing and labour, overhead is a lot smaller for the smaller company,” he said.
In fact, Hasbro and Mattel, two of the biggest toy companies in the world, license their properties to Funko.
Managing so many licenses has also attracted the attention of retailers, helping Funko move quickly into mass-market stores like Wal-Mart, Hot Topic, Barnes & Noble and Target, which has a dedicated Funko area in most of its stores. Funko is also selling direct to consumers through a monthly subscription plan.
But the secret to the company’s success was not the number of licenses that it carried, but the devotion it had for each one, said Mariotti, who is a toy collector himself.
“We are 100 per cent dedicated to everything we are excited about in pop culture,” he said.
— New York Times News Service
