3 ms·

What I find amazing in the linked article (from the footnotes[1]) about Lego's financial situation was that every product engineer used to have carte blanche to

What I find amazing in the linked article (from the footnotes[1]) about Lego's financial situation was that every product engineer used to have carte blanche to go out and acquire tons of resin, just to make one set. That, and the effort they went to to service small, local stores. It's both amazing and depressing; obviously it doesn't scale at all, but it really sounds like a kickass corporate culture. Wired had a similar article about people who design Nerf guns; they also had an amazing lab-area dedicated to cobbling together new toys[2]. My point being, toy-making sounds like an awesome job. I wonder if the people who do it are mech/materials/structural engineers, or if it's still a craft? I would totally go and design toys and write Python scripts to model Nerf trajectories for the rest of my life. 1. http://www.strategy-business.com/article/07306?pg=1 http://www.strategy-business.com/article/07306?pg=1 2. http://www.wired.com/design/2012/09/how-nerf-became-worlds-best-purveyor-of-big-guns-for-kids/ http://www.wired.com/design/2012/09/how-nerf-became-worlds-b...

wglb 14y ago
I have an acquaintance who by profession is a toy designer. She is independent and highly thought of, but all the work is speculative. If your design doesn't make it past the first review, all your work is for naught. She is very creative and bright and is quite resourceful in putting ideas into prototype phase and has had some big wins. But there is a certain stress level associated with any creative endeavor. The situation you are noting is within the big toy companies, and no doubt that they have an awesome job.
- panacea 14y ago
  When swapping a plastic cat in place of a plastic iron makes BBC news because 'social media', I reckon the market is saturated by nostalgia trips and unless you get the gig to design a plastic cat and social media strategy? Nostalgia tralalala
- alanctgardner2 14y ago
  I can imagine in her case, it would require a very well-rounded individual to design the toy, come up with marketing/branding, build it and pitch it. I was definitely thinking of working in the pipeline at a larger company, like you said, where someone could be more specialized and focus on one aspect of the design. Does she have any interest in moving to a big company? As in, doing spec work until she demonstrates she's competent, and gets hired on? Or is there a career in freelance toy design? Like any self-employment it would be stressful, but you'd be more exciting at parties than the millionth person building FarmBookVille Freemium.
  - wglb 14y ago
    I would say that she is very well-rounded. She came from a big company, and I think it fell apart or moved away from Chicago (at one time, the toy-design capital) and struck out on her own. I think it is quite unlikely that she would now leave the freelance life.
DanBC 14y ago
> My point being, toy-making sounds like an awesome job Unfortunately, toy making and designing is a vicious ultra-competitive business, dominated by a few huge companies. The book "The Real Toy Story: Inside the Ruthless Battle for Britain's Youngest Consumers" is interesting. And the biases (as you can tell from the title) are pretty clear. (http://www.amazon.co.uk/Real-Toy-Story-Ruthless-Consumers/dp/0552774065/ http://www.amazon.co.uk/Real-Toy-Story-Ruthless-Consumers/dp...)

wglb 14y ago

I have an acquaintance who by profession is a toy designer. She is independent and highly thought of, but all the work is speculative. If your design doesn't make it past the first review, all your work is for naught. She is very creative and bright and is quite resourceful in putting ideas into prototype phase and has had some big wins. But there is a certain stress level associated with any creative endeavor. The situation you are noting is within the big toy companies, and no doubt that they have an awesome job.

panacea 14y ago
When swapping a plastic cat in place of a plastic iron makes BBC news because 'social media', I reckon the market is saturated by nostalgia trips and unless you get the gig to design a plastic cat and social media strategy? Nostalgia tralalala
alanctgardner2 14y ago
I can imagine in her case, it would require a very well-rounded individual to design the toy, come up with marketing/branding, build it and pitch it. I was definitely thinking of working in the pipeline at a larger company, like you said, where someone could be more specialized and focus on one aspect of the design. Does she have any interest in moving to a big company? As in, doing spec work until she demonstrates she's competent, and gets hired on? Or is there a career in freelance toy design? Like any self-employment it would be stressful, but you'd be more exciting at parties than the millionth person building FarmBookVille Freemium.
- wglb 14y ago
  I would say that she is very well-rounded. She came from a big company, and I think it fell apart or moved away from Chicago (at one time, the toy-design capital) and struck out on her own. I think it is quite unlikely that she would now leave the freelance life.

DanBC 14y ago

> My point being, toy-making sounds like an awesome job Unfortunately, toy making and designing is a vicious ultra-competitive business, dominated by a few huge companies. The book "The Real Toy Story: Inside the Ruthless Battle for Britain's Youngest Consumers" is interesting. And the biases (as you can tell from the title) are pretty clear. (http://www.amazon.co.uk/Real-Toy-Story-Ruthless-Consumers/dp/0552774065/ http://www.amazon.co.uk/Real-Toy-Story-Ruthless-Consumers/dp...)