Episode #195: Instant Insights Into The Toy Industry Uncovered at CHITAG Part 1 of 2
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Are you passionate about toy design and eager to learn from the best in the toy industry? This episode of Making It In The Toy Industry takes you inside the Chicago Toy and Game Fair (ChiTag), a hub of innovation and creativity in the toy and game industry. Learn tips from show attendees who specialize in toy marketing, toy sales, and game innovation. Whether you're an aspiring toy inventor, a game design enthusiast, or simply fascinated by the world of toys, this episode includes 3 mini and action packed interviews.
Listen in as Azhelle challenges her guests to a game of Buildzi while interviewing them about their areas of expertise. Learn tips from Tami of Tamic Strategies, Monica of Boogie Board, and Keegan, inventor of the game Endless. Each guest shares their unique perspective on the industry – Tami discusses strategic approaches to managing overstock and market fluctuations, Monica showcases the cutting-edge, sustainable technology behind Boogie Boards, and Keegan illustrates the process of inventing and testing his award-winning game "Endless." These conversations not only shed light on the nuances of toy and game development but also offer practical advice for how to make and sell your own toys and games.
Episode Cliff Notes:
Navigating Overstock in Toy Industry with Tami
Boogie Board's Innovation in Toys Explained by Monica
Keegan Shares His Award-Winning Game Design Journey
Networking and Collaboration in the Toy Sector
Effective Marketing Strategies in Toy Industry with Monica
Licensing and Commercializing Toy Inventions
Tackling the Challenge of Product Imitation
Essential Advice for Aspiring Toy Inventors from Keegan
Growth and Adaptation in the Toy Business with Tami
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This episode is brought to you by People of Play and CHITAG! Thank you for being a sponsor!
Learn more about CHITAG by visiting chitag.com
Learn more about People of Play by visiting peopleofplay.com
Watch these interviews on YouTube.
Check out The Toy Coach Gift Guide: https://thetoycoach.com/gift
Interested in a LIVE AI corporate training for your company? Click here for details.
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You are listening to Making It In The Toy Industry, episode number 📍 195.
Hey there, toy people, Azhelle Wade here, and welcome back to another episode of the Toy Coach Podcast, making it in the toy industry. This is a weekly podcast, and today's episode is sponsored by People of Play. People of Play is where you can stay up to date with the latest news on toys and games.
You can be the first to hear about new releases. If you are a consumer, you can meet the inventors behind your favorite toys and games, but it is also a networking hub for toy industry executives. So check out peopleofplay. com.
Well, you may have heard me talk about People of Play Week recently on this podcast and ChiTag, the public toy and game fair that happens during that week.
Well, I was... in Chicago at the event. And I held in person interviews sponsored by ChiTag. And those interviews are what I'm going to share with you today. before we dive into this episode, I had a great time at People of Play Week.
I did a talk. On AI in the toy industry and how AI can help you come up with toy and game ideas. If you want to learn more about that, visit learn. thetoycoach. com slash AI toy box. we have a live corporate training currently available and we'll be releasing an AI video as soon as possible on our YouTube channel.
. I also was lucky enough to present an award at the prestigious Taggy Awards along with the toy guy, Chris Byrne, that was super fun. So if you weren't a part of ChiTag this year or people have.
play this year. I hope that you're a part of it next year. And if you go, because you've heard it on this podcast, let me know. I've got a bonus for you. If you let me know you're heading to an event because you heard about it on this podcast, send me a message at info at the toy coach. com. Now. Let's talk about these interviews that you're going to listen to.
For today's episode, we are going to hear from Tammy Murphy of Tamik Strategies. We are going to talk with Monica from Boogie Board, and we're going to chat with Keegan, the creator of the game Endless, and one of the winners at the Young Inventors Challenge during People of Play Week.
So let me describe what's going on in these episodes. In these live interviews, we were playing a game called Buildsy. This is a game you can grab the link to off of the Toy Coach Gift Guide. Just go to thetoycoach. com slash gift. . And BuildZ is essentially a bunch of blocks, imagine Tetris blocks, and it comes with a set of cards that gives you towers to build with these blocks. At the start of every interview, I am pulling a new card from the BuildZ card deck. And that is the tower that the guest and I are racing to build. So you will hear us racing to build towers, you'll hear blocks falling down mid interview, and some of these interviews I won and some I lost.
As you're listening, if you feel the pull to see what's going on, head over to thetoycoach.
com forward slash 195. And there you will see the links to the YouTube videos of these interviews.
So without further ado, let's dive into our first interview with Tammy from Tammic Strategies.
I'm here with Tammy Murphy of Tamic Strategies, and we're going to play a little game while we interview.
So today we are going to be trying to build our towers. And the goal is for each of us to beat the other person, whoever builds a tower the fastest is the winner of that round. Then we're going to move on to the second round. Then we're going to move on to the third round. Two out of three wins. game. Each round is going to feature different interview questions starting with questions to learn about our guest.
Tammy, welcome to the newest edition of the Making It in the Toy Industry podcast. So happy to have you here.
I'm happy to be here.
This is fun. It's going to be fun. So our round one, we are going to be building this tower. And we're going to be talking about Tammy's career and experience in the industry.
Ready, set, go.
Tammy, how long have you been in the toy industry?
17 years.
Actually, November. November 27th will be 17 years. Why do you remember the exact date? I happen to have just seen it like a couple of weeks ago. I was curious about what my hire date was at my first company. And so I looked it up and yeah, so November 27th is 17 years. What was that first company? The first company was the Haywire group.
It was a startup game company. And I joined, I think if I remember right, I was the first official full time employee. Everyone else had another job and I was dedicated towards growing Haywire Group. So, and as anyone who knows, if you're in a startup, you do everything. So what I remember, right? Yeah. I remember, I, we had our own warehouse, so I would I've helped unload containers.
I would receive an order. I'd run downstairs. I'd fill it. I'd FedEx it. I'd run upstairs. I'd invoice it and off it would go. What were they selling? Well, we started with some poker and poker was really, poker games were really trendy back then. And actually we got our poker games right as they, it was that trend was dying.
So we had a lot of inventory that nobody wanted. it Was my first introduction into working in the overstocks to you know, figure out how to move inventory.
Okay. You won? I was beat. I was beat. Oh my, actually perfect timing for round two. All right. Tammy Murphy, one, Ajelle, zero.
Oh my gosh, I can't believe I got beat so bad. Let's go. Okay. Question for you, Tammy. For a designer who has developed a product that they cannot sell through, what are some methods for them to sell through that product? How can they get through it?
Well, that's challenging. We used to use, you know, there are a lot of overstock buyers out there. You know, Ollie's here in the Midwest. I think Ollie's is around more than just in the Midwest. I think back then they were based in Ohio. They probably still are based in Ohio. So we use them. There's Ocean State job lots and the others.
So I would start, I would start with that. And, Oh,
are you kidding me? Are you kidding me? No, absolutely not. It's not done yet. It ain't over till it's stands. Are you seeing how I'm embarrassed. I lost the whole game. Well, we're going to have to do a round three.
Yeah. We're going to have to just finish round three.
I am also a little bit competitive in
case she was stalling. She was asking questions, answering them so slowly. I see you. So before we go to round three, really how would somebody go about finding the right overstock business for them? What did they search? Who do they talk to?
So if I didn't already know the buyers, I would tap into the people in the industry.
I know who could potentially connect me to a buyer saying, you know, either make the introduction for me or Provide me their contact information, their email so I could reach out or LinkedIn is lovely to find buyers and figure out who's who in the industry. And I would work the network until I found those buyers.
Buyers were specifically overstock.
There are, they do a lot of business. There are buyers specifically for all those businesses and I, that's where I would
start. So with retail stores, it's easy to go on Google maps and look up specialty Stores, to find a list of the names Yeah. And locations. But how do you find an overstock buyer?
Well figure out who the businesses are, right? Overstock is Ollie's here in the Midwest. Basically a Google search of who buys overstock inventory, who buys print run inventory, who close out inventory, all that. And there are companies
who buy them. And if you're at a toy trade show, what would be a good way to try to connect with those or find those people? Are they normally walking the floor or
are they in the league?
They do. And they schedule meetings. And when Toy Fair was in February, it was always nice because you've closed out the year.
So for them, shopping in February at Toy Fair made so much sense, right? Because everyone was introducing their new lineup and they knew what they were moving out of.
You know what? At this last Toy Fair, which was in September, I did get a lot of cards from overstock and we need to know what is our overstock product, but it's so hard because it's, we're not done with it.
You don't know.
I would also, you know, be creative, right? Have online sales. Like even if you sold it at your wholesale costs or your, your manufacturing costs, right? Yeah. And you had your own closeout sales. To people because closeout people are going to give you not a lot of money, you know?
I would personally try to move as much of it you could yourself because why not? Because then you're getting a little bit more money recovering your costs and then you could then sell the rest to overstock.
What about people that are hesitant about devaluing their product if they put it on their website for 80 percent off?
Well, they're moving. We're moving out of that product anyway, right? And they can be, you can be honest, right? You can say, this is a clearance tab. We're closing out this game. We're moving on or this toy,
What is the percentage though? they've tried to negotiate for me is like a 10 to 20 percent off of wholesale price. Off of wholesale.
And then shipping. And then shipping. Negotiate. Yeah. Because probably they're not going to want to pay for shipping.
So then really you're at zero.
Or hopefully you're at your landed cost. You know, and at least a little bit less and you've taken a little bit of a hit, but not
the whole hit.
Fair. Oh, that was great. Okay. Round three. Okay. We are going to be creating... Tammy is so I'm going Question shy tag. Tell me, how many years have you been coming to
this show?
Well, this is my first year at this location. I was at shy tag pre COVID and haven't been back since. Okay. So, and I love this location. So much. Same. Same. It is so much better. Navy Pier was great, but I think it outgrew Navy Pier, right? It needed so much more. I
did it.
I did it. I still lost the whole game, but I came back with a one out of two. Keep it. All right. Keep going. I mean, I intentionally, I was. Focus. I was like, I can't lose all three. You asked
me a very open ending question. So
I'm like, you did
I will say this year. Yeah. Oh my gosh. It's crazy. so crowded, right? There's so many people. I have seen a lot of kids playing, a lot of families laughing. I've seen kids crying because their parents were making them go home.
I
felt so bad. He was just sitting there on the bench crying and pulling his hat over. And mom and dad are like, I'm sorry, we gotta go. I feel like I don't want to go. Oh, that's great. So we've seen a lot. Yeah. And I've talked to, been talking to the vendors and they've been, we've so busy, we haven't had a break.
The
energy here is huge. You, you walk through, you see the energy, you see the kids playing, you see like, booths are lively.
This is definitely, feels like we've overcome some kind of hump. And it's a consumer show. And how often do we get to watch little kids and their families with their parents playing with toys and games? Yeah. Right? And we, we spend so much time at these industry trade shows and you just lose.
lot of sight sometimes of who we're making the product for and how much fun and enjoyment we get out of seeing the people we make the product for playing with
the product. ,
toy retailers haboos. here. Right behind me is a toy retailer.
Right. If you find out that your retail partner is going to be at Chi Tag, how can you support
them while being here? You can support them by getting a booth and playing with the products and then sending them over to your retailer to buy.
So then they have like two touch points, right? Right.
And then you don't have to deal with sales tax as a vendor.
And the vibe is just, unlike any other.
So worthwhile getting in front of people in the industry in like a fun personal way that we don't often get to do. I'm happy to get my own game. It's fine.
Well, I do have this game at home
and have played. Oh, well, I You should have said that, then we would have done the hard, we would have done the
hard. Now, why would I rush up to that? Thank you so much. All right. All right. Take care.
And that wraps up my interview with Tammy Murphy of Tamek Strategies. If you've got product that you're trying to sell out of, I hope you found some insight from our overstock conversation. Our next interview is with Monica, Marketing Director of Boogie Board. Let's listen into that right now.
Hey, Monica. Hello, Agile. Welcome to the show. We're so excited to be here.
We're going to be doing a new interview format today and I can't wait to get into it. But first we've got to talk about the product Boogie Board.
So tell me a little bit about what the Boogie Board is. What version of it am I holding here? Please break it all down. All right, absolutely. So Boogie Board is is a consumer brand that's part of a larger company called Kent Displays Incorporated. All of the toys and all of our other consumer products at large feature patented liquid crystal technology. So what this means is that, you know, the toys and the products, there are two pieces of film that literally have liquid crystal in between. And so when you write on the board itself, which is pressure sensitive, the liquid crystal molecules are twisting. And so you're actually seeing that reflective light. That's how you get the cool green writing on the, on the boards. So so yeah, so what is so awesome about all of our toys is that they are paper free, they're screen free, they're reusable. So they're really great in terms of promoting sustainability and they're super, super creative. They hold children's attention for a long time and kids have so much fun with them, but without that blue light that comes with the screen.
Right here we have, is this the classic boogie board?
So this is called our kids jot. So this is modeled after our boogie board shot, which sort of originated more as a grownups writing tablet. And this is really much more of a kid, a kid friendly version. So we have a ton of really fun designs for kids. And actually all of the kids that participated in the, in the young inventor challenge today, they're all taking one of these home.
Oh, wow. You're a sponsor sponsor messing around. We are a sponsor sponsor. And and what's so great is like we had some extra. So hopefully like other kids, even that didn't participate are going to take one home as well. So We brought one for you. So show me how to use my new toy. Okay, absolutely. So I mean, so easy.
So you just, you know, the clear button is always going to be at the top somewhere. All of the products come with some form of a stylus or a writing tool. So again, you just, you know, we can do tic tac toe, you know, we can do our doodles, we can write our names.
And then again, when we're ready to clear Yeah, it's like one second over and over. And then what the company has done such an amazing job at is sort of taking this core technology and then really new wants to get for different children's toys.
So for example, our sketch pals, these were really born of the insight that kids are on the bus for an average of an hour a day so all of our sketch pals come with this amazing little rubber clip and so they're amazing for back. And for travel suitcases. And so again, it's that same technology kids can do, you know, practicing the letters or little doodles and drawings and their name and all that fun stuff.
And then you just hit the nose, but that's cute. But what's so amazing about these is the stylus is actually tethered, right? So like if you're in the back of the car, like, you know, parents aren't going to be like, wait, where'd the stylus go? You know, everything is, you know, it's very all encompassing.
This is one of our most popular items over 90 percent sell they just they're one of our top sellers.
Toy retailers love them. Families love them. Kids love them. What's the price point? 1999, 1999. Now this rainbow one, what's the situation here? Where's the stylist? So look at how fun this is.
Okay. So they're built in. I know. I mean, I could take zero credit. How cool is this design? It is so cool. So this is our scribble and play our scribble and play product. And so, you know, think of this as a little bit more, isn't this fun? And so it's so much more sensory. It's much more, much more of a tactile experience.
So we call these our texture tools. So when I was in toy design school we took marker rendering class and all the markers had this like angle thing and it was really hard to get used to the feeling of a good marker render swipe.
So this is really bringing me back and it's so clean. So the inspiration for this. Product in particular was scratch art. So you scratch it off and that rainbow effect is revealed. Now we know about boogie board. We know about your products. Now know you. Oh, I'm ready. I'm ready. And we're going to do that with this game.
We're going to compete while I'm interviewing. Okay. Okay. So we're going to try to create this. You can either create it flat on the table or you can stack it. But also I'm going to be asking you interview questions while we do this. And that's it. Okay. I'm so nervous.
Monica and I have just met at this show, so I don't know her, so I'm going to get to know you. I'm gonna get to know you and at the same time try to beat you in this game. Okay. Ready, set, go. So how long have you worked in the toy industry?
I have worked in the lifestyle CPG space, Uhhuh for nearly 20 years. Uhhuh . So toy specifically, yeah. Six months. And what do you like about the toy industry that other industries didn't have?
I love the imagination. I love that your focus group is not a bunch of adults. Your most important customers are these like growing minds who have no filter and just are filled with such optimism and I just, I think so far those have to be my favorite things. I have two small children of my own.
And they just think mom's job is like the coolest, the coolest. I mean, every time they say it warms my heart.
What do you think people should do if they want to start a career in marketing? I think it I think marketing is goin you if you start in a fiel are passionate about.
So started in beauty. So like shampoo, conditioner it was an area that I genuinely loved and so it was easy for me to sort of grow from there. Be a voracious reader, like consume everything, consume the news, consume social media.
I think, you know, don't just read up on things you like, read up on different opinions and different people in different places. And I think just as much as you can kind of just broaden your, you know, that. Aperture on the things you're looking at. That's just going to give you different ideas in terms of how you think about marketing.
Yeah. So I think those are, those are a couple of my, my top tips. For people that are interviewing for marketing jobs. What is something they could say in an interview that would have the interviewer of being like oh, wow. They know what they're doing. Do your homework and really go into that interview. Like knowing the brand inside and out. Pretend you already worked there. I mean, here's the thing, the people that you're interviewing with, they're not going to expect you to know everything, but if you can go in there just knowing more than they expect you to do to know that's really, they're going to be like, oh my gosh, wow, this person, like they care, they want this role.
They did their homework. They're bringing us, you know, cause again, the better, you know, the brand going in. You're going to have ideas going into the interview, right? You're going to go, well, did you think about this? Or what about this influencer or you know, this type of event or this partnership, you, you know, the, the team could do.
So I think as well as you could know the brand kind of in advance, it's going to spark creative thinking. That's going to come through in the interview. So that's one thing I read in an article. Oh, you won,
now we're switching because I lost. Alright, we're going to do this one. Oh, this one looks significantly harder. What are your goals with boogie board? Do you have some big goals this year that you want to hit as marketer? Well, you know, I'm so new to the role, but something that I'm doing, I'm helping the company with, we're really working on it as a team, but it's just been so exciting is launching our anti copycat efforts.
So the brand really invented the entire category. They invented the world's first reusable LCD writing and drawing tablet and thus the category at large. And now there are just a ton of dupes. It's a ton of copycats. So when I came in, I was really charged with, you know, let's work together with the marketing team and kind of get a program off the ground that educates shoppers on, you know, what sets us apart, why you should shop an original boogie board versus a do boogie board.
And here's the thing. Look, we're not here to shame anybody, right? Like, yeah, I mean everyone is comparison shopping. We actually have a, a swap program launched, which is so cool.
A swap. A swap with a piece swap? Yeah. Oh, really? With the, with the es, with the dpe. So like if you own a dpe, you could take a picture with it, write, you know, just sign and date the board. Right? Not a boogie board. You send us the photo on our website. There's a whole little super three step easy portal. And we're gonna send you a real boogie board for free.
Sweet. So I would say in terms of, you know, goals of Boogie Board, I mean, it just, you know, honestly, we've just scratched the surface of programs up and running. It's doing awesome. We just want to keep doing things like the young adventures challenge, like the SWAT program.
Again, just to educate people so that they really understand, you know what's behind the price tag, right? It is, it's a world first, it's patented technology. It's really superior quality materials. It's, you know, we do a ton of safety testing talk tripping over my words.
I know we haven't even built my, I haven't built my tower, but you know, just above and above and beyond in terms of safety testing. So, you know, we're really trying to just kind of educate people on all those very smart angle. Just fighting with quality and not trying to compete, compete on price.
To your point right now, we're just in a space where it's like, you know what? It is an exceptional product. We're going to talk about it. And you know, we, we hope you'll try us. And you look at it as like the Apple of, of like your category of toys. Apple doesn't. right? Because other people can give a similar phone at the similar thing. Like that doesn't happen, right? Oh no, it's falling. It's falling. I got too excited. I, and I did it. One more round of questions. Okay. And then we'll have a winner and this is my new format. I love it. Okay, here we go. This is what we're doing next. See it. Here we go.
Okay. Let's talk Toy industry. Okay. Okay. I want to say you're going down, but I'm very bad at this. So I'm not gonna I can't say that at this point, actually, let's talk about the Chicago Toy and Game Fair. Oh my gosh. Yes. How has the fair been for you? The fair has been absolutely incredible. We did not do a booth this year. This sort of came together, very quickly, but so we really came, you know, in support of our product authenticity program, you know, something we kind of say in the office, just in the hallway all the time. Oh my gosh, you're so fast. I'm so behind, but something we say, you know, is.
Like the best way to sort of fight a world of dupes is with future innovators, right? Like, how do you, how do you fight dupes and copycats? It's with like, you know, supporting innovative thinking. So you know, we just, we were like, we have to be there. I mean, these young inventors, these kids that are just working so hard and have these amazing ideas and are pitching them and like already thinking about like, how do I brand this?
So all the young inventors are taking home a boogie board for. You know, and we did a little card, you know, for your ideas. So yeah, yeah, for all the good ideas. So, but no, I mean, honestly, we just are so honored to be a part of this.
You know, just to marry and Aaron and Tammy and just like the whole team, everyone has just been so supportive and just it's just been a really collaborative process.
Okay. I have one more question for you. I think this is going to be a good closeout question as I win. I get you are so good at this. You're so good at this. I'm like, we, I really, my takeaway is that I need to never do an interview like this ever again. It's amazing. Does Boogie Board have a program in which when people buy your product, do they like register it?
Is there some sort of warranty? I ask this because high end brands, brands tend to have something where you buy the product, you register it online and there's a warranty or you get updates or something. Do you have a program?
We do. We do have a warranty. We do have a warranty. Okay. And then you can sort of buy extra warranties as you need. So I think sort of base level, we have kind of a you know, just a satisfaction guarantee if you get it home, if something isn't working right, if you're just not happy, you call us. And then yes, we do offer kind of warranties where you can go on and register and get those extra protections for the product.
Marker
That's another conversation is why you don't want the dupe copycat products. They don't offer those warranties cause that's why you're getting that low price. And I mean, even something like customer service, I mean, I mean truly like, I mean you email us it's, myself and a team like let's get back to this person and let's make sure they're taken care of.
And the bigger conversation of safety, which we didn't even touch on .
This is what you're paying for. You're paying for a company that's doing their due diligence, they're developing a quality product. They're part of the supply chain from beginning to end. Well, before I put the final, thank you.
Two out of three. Oh my gosh. I stacked them all. My boss is going to be like, we have to talk. This is so much fun. I hope we can do this again. Yes. It was a pleasure interviewing you, getting to know you, Monica.
That wraps my interview with Monica from Boogie Board. Great insights on how to get started in marketing, if you're interested in that career. Now, if you're interested in getting yourself your own Boogie Board for the holidays, or maybe for someone you love, head over to the toycoach. com forward slash gift, because it is an item that made it into my gift guide. Our next interview is with young inventor Keegan Frank.
So, what we're going to do is we're going to have a three phase interview. And while you're being interviewed, we are going to try to solve these puzzles. It is a race to see who can solve these puzzles first.
You can either put it flat or stack and the first person to finish the puzzle that we have wins that round.
Then we move on to the next round of questions. You ready? We're gonna pick a new card.
Let's mess it all up. Ready? Go. How long you've been in the toy industry, Keegan.
Uh, in the industry? About uh, four hours.
How has your time in the toy industry
been? people. So it's been really fun.
What's one thing that surprised you most about the toy industry so far?
The networks probably how people seem to know each other and like have relationships and past experiences with
each other.
You were telling me a really funny story about a couple that was playing your game. They seemed pretty connected, huh?
They did. It was creepy because I was pitching it to them as part of the, oh no, competition. Pitching the game to them as part of the judging, competition part, and without communicating, they set up the game the exact same way and it was creepy because...
Oh, they did the set up the same way? They set up the exact same way. Oh, I thought you meant they just did the first move the no, no. They set up the same way and then they, played the same opening. Ooh, that's creepy. It was creepy.
They were both pretty good.
You won round one. We're going to move on to round two. Round two, we are going to be talking about advice you have for others like yourself, young inventors.
If you have confidence in your idea, and believe that it is going to do well, then others probably will too. what you are doing. Ah, It fell. Does that count? No! No! No! No! Oh wait, mine fell too.
Okay, you have confidence. Others will believe it too. What gave you confidence in your game idea? Mainly that I had been playtesting it a lot, and that I still think that I have worked out a lot of the errors I ran into in early playtesting. What's the name of your game? Endless. I did it. I did it. It was hard to balance. It was a tough balance. The last one.
We got one more round. Are you gonna take me down? I hope I do. Let's go. Okay, for our final round, we're gonna be talking about Chi Tag and the big thing that you won at this event.
But while we're doing that, we're gonna be building this tower. Here we go. Oh, wait a minute, what? You didn't tell me this could happen. So, what did you just win? I won best game for the older division, which is, I believe, 11 plus. Okay, great. You won best. I won best game. Um, I think... Done. Oh! I'm just kidding. High five. Fair and square.
Tell us about your win. I won best game, for the older division, and, it was probably because the judges enjoyed the abstract strategy of the game, and I think they enjoyed how, like, the board shrank.
Let's bring the board in. What do you think it was about this game that just... I think it was that a lot of the errors that I had run into, like tying and like tie breaking especially, Yeah. Were mostly or completely thought out.
And so that added like a sense of... Being well tested and well thought through, and sincere, and I think the judges really did like that. How many times would you say you playtested this? Me personally playing the game, I probably played it like three dozen, four dozen times. And what about just friends and family?
Well that, so like... Wow. And every time you ran into a problem, would you write it down and keep playing so you could build a list? Or would you immediately stop and try to fix it? I would stop and try to fix it.
So then every time you're playing, you're basically starting over. Because you're starting over with these new rules, so you want to see what new situations occur. Yes.
So what is one big piece of advice you'd give for somebody who has a game, but they're like, Oh, I just don't want to playtest it. I'm having a hard time playtesting it. Playtesting is really important, so if you can find a way to enjoy that, I believe that it is going to lend a lot of, importance to your game, and then you can just go straight back to, error fixing and designing, which is what you like doing.
How did you enjoy playtesting? How'd you make it fun? I enjoyed the strategies, watching the strategies that people created, like with the placement and like the formations. Yeah. And so it was always really fun watching new players play because they're thinking of strategies that I don't.
the fact that you built a game that other people can build their own strategies into, It says a lot for the depth this game that you've created. So a lot of times, winners of the Young Inventors Challenge get their items licensed, so let's all like the video, cross our fingers, and hope that you get this product licensed, because it's an incredible game.
What is the category or the short form description of this game? It's a one dimensional game, one dimensional abstract strategy game for two players. Takes roughly 10 to 15 minutes. It adds many layers to the strategy. That's great! Thank you so much for coming on the show and beating me at my own game.
Thank you for having me.
Well, there you have it. Thanks for popping in and listening to those three interviews. And join me back next week where we're going to pick up on the last three interviews that I did at ChiTag.
Before we close out today's episode, I've got to give a quick shout out to someone who left a review for the podcast. Mamoi Ghefefi, if I said your username right. Mamoi says, practical and so useful. She gave the podcast five stars. They gave the podcast five stars and said, I am really finding this podcast so helpful in learning about the industry and how to get going.
Such a great resource for anyone wanting to learn about the toy invention and the industry. Thank you so much for that review. Now, if you are listening to this podcast and you love this podcast, but you haven't left us a review yet. Now if you are listening to this podcast and you love this podcast, but you haven't left us a review yet, What are you waiting for?
Every time I get a new review, each time a review pops in, I get a notification on my phone. It puts a huge smile on my face and keeps me motivated to keep coming back week after week. So if you, so if you could take a moment wherever you're listening to this episode, just take a pause. Leave us a rating and a review and as always, Thank you so much for spending this time with me today.
I know there are a ton of podcasts out there, so it truly means the world to me that you tune into this one.
Until next week, I'll see you later, 📍 toy people.
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