The Hexbug Nano

We got an reorder of the popular Hexbugs in the other day. In addition to getting more of the original Hexbugs - the mini robotic creatures - we got in a new Hexbug - the Hexbug Nano. It's a even tinier robotic bug that acts like a real bug. The zoom along on the floor and will self-right themselves if they flip over. They're almost creepy they're so real. Since I was in a youtubey mood, I made another video late Friday night about the Hexbugs. Check it out!

Super Underpants Boys Unite!

Jimmy Kimmel did a segment on his show where he tests, er, subjects children to 'new' toy 'inventions.' Hilarity ensues. 

8 Best toys that YoYo Joe's got at/since Toy Fair...so far - #1!

So, if you've been following along, this is the number one item we've gotten since Toy Fair. And, it should be little surprise to those who've been following the blog - it's the EcoAquarium with the uber-cool little African Dwarf Frogs. These guys are so cool (how cool are they?) - they're so cool, we put ice in their tanks to warm them up! (Groan).
The kit comes with two African Dwarf Frogs, a live bamboo plant, a snail to clean up the frogs...er....waste, a scenic rock (good for hiding behind), scenic gravel and 'living' gravel. The living gravel acts as a filter, the bamboo helps oxygenate the water - it's a real little ecosystem!
Really, these are awesome, and they sell awesome as well. They were our #1 best selling item of March! And, we enjoy staring at them all day - see our previous post on them for details of their 'vogueing' habits.

8 Best toys that YoYo Joe's got at/since Toy Fair...so far - #2

No, I didn't forget about this list. Well....actually, I did. But, it's back! In all it's glory, just in time for #2 - Mic-o-Mic Construction toys/Models.

These little plastic toys come in a bunch of parts - you put them together and then you can play with them. They come in different sizes and price points. Plus, the models themselves are pretty cool looking - there's an old fashioned roadster car, a panel truck, a helicopter, a motorcyle with sidecar and others.

8 Best toys that YoYo Joe's got at/since Toy Fair...so far - #3

3 - Tracksters - They're sorta like Webkinz, only for cars. You buy the Hot Wheels sized die cast cars, but that's only half the story. You get a code with each car to enter online to get your car activated. Once you have your car, you can race it, hop it up (with codes from packs of cards sold separately), give it a new paint job. Not your daddy's Hot Wheels. It's sorta like a toy and video game all wrapped into one!

8 Best toys that YoYo Joe's got at/since Toy Fair...so far - #4

#4 - Miyim Soft Toys - Not only are these plush toys awesomely soft and lovable, they're organic & won't break your budget.
For the past two years at Toy Fair, I've seen lots of toys that are jumping on the renewable, organic & recycling bandwagon. Alas, these features usually come at a price, it's just a part of the industry that needs to grow more for prices to come down. We were thrilled to find miYim organic toys at this year's Toy Fair, as they fit the bill as far as quality and price.
Consider the "Baby Fred Plush Monkey" on the left. It's 9 inches tall, made from soft organic cotton, colored with non-toxic dyes and chemical free. He comes wearing a white hemp jacket, and it's only $22.99. It even comes in a recycled box that makes for great gift-giving.
The Bunny Lovie Blankie (right) is 10x10 and is also made from the organic cotton material and dyed with non-toxic dyes. It's only $15.99.
All their items are appropriate for all ages

8 Best toys that YoYo Joe's got at/since Toy Fair...so far - #5

5 - The Dripstik - This is one of those 'now, why didn't I think of that?' items. It's just a plastic handle with two sides. One side holds a popsicle stick, the other will hold an ice cream cone. Both sides have a drip catching moat around the handle. You know, sometimes when you're (um...your child) is eating an ice cream cone and it starts dripping? Yea, it's for that. Toldya

8 Best toys that YoYo Joe's got at/since Toy Fair...so far - #6

6 - Hex Bugs - Little robotic bugs at little prices. The smallest of the 'bugs' has antenna that act as a guide - when it bumps into the wall, it turns around and heads in a different direction. There's also a little crab that automatically seeks dark places (emo crab?) and a remote control 'worm' that spins and walks at your command. They run from $10.99 - $22.99.

Wanna geek it out? They seem to be popular targets for people to modify. Don't believe me, search for 'Hex Bug' on youtube or check out this blog posting of a hack to your HexBug to add a PCI board to it.

Check this Toy Directory video from Toy Fair:

Watch Video

8 Best toys that YoYo Joe's got at/since Toy Fair...so far

7 - Woodstock instruments.

At YoYo Joe's, we pride ourselves that we try to listen to our customers. So, when a customer came in sometime in January looking for a decent quality kids guitar, we made note. We have carried a guitar that is not too expensive, but wooden and works. It did have a couple issues - the strings had a hard time staying tight. Really, it is made more for a child to pretend to play guitar, but if you're gonna buy a guitar for your child, why not get make it playable?

We agreed, so we sought out a company with a decent kids guitar at Toy Fair. When we got to the Woodstock Percussion booth, we felt we found what we were looking for. It's a wooden guitar - a little bigger than our older one - it's 27 inches long. What I like about it is that the strings stay tight. You can really play it! You can actually listen to it being played here. And while it's more than our old guitar, it's still not terribly expensive.

Woodstock also makes other cool things, we especially like the mini chimalong, chimes that are easy for kids to play songs right out of the box.

8 Best toys that YoYo Joe's got at/since Toy Fair...so far

8 - Uglydoll action figures. Why? Cause they're Uglydolls!, and they're action figures! They're two, two, two toys in one. Little vinyl figures of your favorite Uglydolls. Note to consumer: Ugly means Awesome!

Frogs have taken over at YoYo Joe's

We found lots of new stuff at Toy Fair, some which we loved, some which we hated, some which we had no idea whether it was good or not.
Under the last category was the EcoAquarium. It's a small square plastic aquarium with a living eco system inside. Each aquarium includes 'living gravel,' a living stalk of bamboo, at least one snail and two dwarf African frogs (or in the case of our current stock - three frogs since they sent us some extras). The aquariums are small (4x4x5), and require only minimal maintenance. You feed the frogs twice a week (a years supply of food is included - although with a 'bonus' frog, it may only last 2/3 of a year). You clean out the water twice a year with spring water (no tap water, no distilled water). The snail should clean out the frog....er...waste... Oh, and they're all male, so no mating will take place (or no successful mating, anyway)
The frogs have been an endless source of entertainment to us since they arrived last week. They seem to be partial to 'voguing,' seemingly freezing into poses for several minutes, then lauching into motion. We have several names for their poses.

- The Ahhnold Scwhartzenfrogger - Posing like a muscleman (no girly frogs here)
- The Dead Frog's Float - We thought one frog was dead, to the point where I opened the aquarium and poked him a bit and he didn't move. I told the customer that I felt the frog was 'no longer with us,' when the frog launched into action.

- The Leap Frog - one frog is piled up on another

- The Running Man (er...frog)- seemingly posing mid stride. 

Worst Toy at Toy Fair 2009

This is my third year to name the 'Worst Toy at Toy Fair.' Previous winners included Rubik's Revolution and the Carmen Electra stripper pole.

Actually, this was the second worst toy I saw at Toy Fair this year. The first was so offensive, I dared not even post it! So, this will have to do. New, from Outset Media, it's the Fart! game. Complete with cards marked with titles like 'Silent But Deadly,' 'Duvet Lifter,' 'Eggy Stinker,' and 'Pant Ripper.'

Look, I know that farting is natural. And it comes with a 99-track CD chock filled with fart sounds. And yes, it is the funniest thing in the world for boys aged 4-97, but come on, really? Do we need nicknames for specific kinds of farts? Do we really want to encourage farting and talking about farting with a group that doesn't even need a good excuse to talk farts? Hey, boys are gonna talk about farts, they're gonna fart, they're gonna giggle when you say the word 'fart,' - it's all good, but I do not wanna play a game called Fart! thank you very much.

Cool new toys - Playmobil Egyptian Pyramid

Each year, guys from the Mitchell's train department would head out to Nuremberg, Germany to see the train building. They'd stop by the massive Playmobil booth to pick up the latest German Playmobil catalog. Why? Because Playmobil would debut their newest toys in Europe, then roll them out in the US the next year. So, if I wanted a sneak peek at next year's Playmobil items, all I had to do was to get a copy of the German catalog and see what was new.

Now, with the magic of the internets, we don't need no stinking German catalog to see what's coming next year, we just point and click, baby!

All this is a lead up to introducing an upcoming theme for Playmobil in 2009 - the Egyptian Pyramid theme. I took a couple pictures of the pyramid. It is awesome looking, like all their toys. Rich in detail and with cool little features, I'm sure it will be a hit.

Who you callin' Ugly?

OK, I admit it. I'm somewhat of an Uglydoll fanboy now. As I've told you before, I was not a fan of the Uglydoll when I first saw them at Toy Fair. But, how things have changed. The little booth I first saw at Toy Fair keeps growing and the hype keeps getting bigger on these soft and comfy plush toys. As I mentioned last week, Ethan and I headed up to Comic Con last week but left before David Horvath, one of the creators of the Uglydolls, appeared. We grabbed a couple copies of his book, Bossy Bear, in hopes that I'd see him at Toy Fair. 

I kept stopping in at the Uglydoll booth to see if I could catch up with David, and finally, on the second day, I stopped in when he was there. He was kind enough to talk with me for a couple minutes about his blog, and then he signed one of the books for Ethan, one for YoYo Joe's and a Babo keychain. He also posed for a pic with Emily and I. 

One of the toys I expect to be in demand from Toy Fair was initially made available at Comic Con, but is now shipping to all retailers who ordered them. It's Uglydoll action figures! Packaged in a blind box! (For those not in the know, a 'blind box' is a marketing genius' way of saying 'you have no idea what you're getting so you will probably voluntarily purchase two of the same figures so we make more monkey, muhahaha') We'll have Uglydoll action figured in a couple weeks. 

Long live Uglydolls!

Cool toys at Toy Fair - HaPe Musical Quadrilla

One of the most popular things for people to play with in our store is the Quadrilla display. It's a cool wooden marble run toy that lets the marbles choose their own path down a circular tower of blocks. All day, we hear the plunk of marbles dropping into the display and rolling down the wooden channels.
HaPe showed off the newest incarnation of it's Quadrilla line at Toy Fair. This is the same basic system, but adds little metal plates where the marbles drop. The metal plates look like what would result if someone took apart a xylophone and placed the metal parts on a Quadrilla set. Each plate makes a different tone, so the marbles dropping down make a pleasant song that never repeats. It even seems like someone with a lot of time and imagination could actually write a song that could be played out by dropping marbles in a sequence.
It looks really fun!
This display was at their booth at Toy Fair, which Emily and I visited on Monday while they were celebrating their anniversary with champagne & cupcakes. It's a tough life, playing with toys and eating cupcakes, but someone's gotta do it, right? This display will not be available at stores, but we should have some kind of display showing it off when it becomes available.

We totally stole this picture from the woot.com blog from Toy Fair.

Toy Fair - Day One

Yesterday was a long day. Emily and I went to a concert on Saturday night - which ended around 1 am. After we got home (around 2), we got a good 4 hours sleep before we woke up to head up to Toy Fair. Add in walking the Toy Fair floor for 9 hours, 2 hours of the ASTRA party....we were a bit tired. 

Anyhow, back to the Fair itself. To me, there was a noticeable lack of traffic in the aisles. There seem to be much less people at Toy Fair this year. The ASTRA Party With the Stars was a big change from last year, with much fewer people than last year - hopefully that's just an effect of cost-cutting, rather than less retailers being a part of the show. 

We decided recently to take part in a catalog program (YoYo Joe's catalogs!) and have specific items to get into our store that are included in the catalog. So, we have a lot of buying to do at Toy Fair. So we put in maybe 7 aisles yesterday (out of 40 ish?). We have a lot of work to do over the next two days! 

We saw lots of new toys that we'll be getting - some of the highlights include some awesome party games from Buffalo Games, the new musical Quadrilla from HaPe and the new Uglydoll action figures. We also ordered Bakugon and Tech Decks for the first time.