Top Trends in Toy Collecting in 2019
How the Toy Market is Changing in 2019
The toy market can be a fickle thing. Bubbles form and burst, like the
Beanie Baby craze, trends come and go. One thing that will never
change is that the collector toy market is driven in principle by two
main drivers: fandom and nostalgia.
There was a time when toys stood alone without being backed by any
intellectual property, like Barbie and the original incarnation of GI Joe.
When companies like Mego began licensing popular properties like
Star Trek and Marvel, the door started to open for figures based on
popular media.
The Kenner Star Wars line blew that door off of its
hinges.
Since then, toys, and especially action figures, have been dominated
by a licensed property. In recent years, Funko has taken this to new
extremes. The ever-popular Funko POP line has taken the market by
storm with highly stylized vinyl figures that are small and cheap to buy
at retail. The packaging makes them easy to display in stores or in
collections.
The true power behind the Funko POP line is intellectual properties. If
you can think of a movie, TV show, sports franchise, video game,
advertising mascot, or any other cultural figure, chances are they have
a POP. The British royal family has POPs. Bob Ross has a POP. You
get the idea.
Funko pays sometimes exorbitant fees to license these properties
because they know part of the magic of their brand is to have one
uniform style figure that can take the form of any fandom imaginable.
They know that collectors collect because they love the properties
represented by the figures.
Companies like NECCA have seen their profile rise by offering high-end, ultra-detailed figures of popular brands. Even standard toy giants
like Mattel and Hasbro have incorporated 6-inch scale high-caliber
figures into most of their popular lines (Marvel Legends, Star Wars
Black Series, WWE Elite, etc.).
Fandom drives current toy sales, as it has in the past, and nostalgia is
still the driving force behind the vintage toy market. Vintage collectors
are adults who want to recapture the way they felt as a kid through the
toys they loved. Sometimes this means grabbing the toys they had
once and want to have again. Other times collectors seek out the toys
they always wanted. Others enjoy the hunt and want to complete the
line.
In all cases, nostalgia is the driving force behind vintage toy booms.
The current vintage boom has been centered on 80s toys, just as the
80s were all about the 50s (looking at you, Back to the Future), the
90s were about the 70s (looking at you, That 70s Show), and so on.
If you’re sitting on 90s or 2000s toys, consider this: the kids who grew
up with, played with, and loved those toys are becoming adults. Soon
they will be the ones looking for a nostalgia fix.
If you’re considering
selling your toy collection, contact Coast2Coast Auctions ® at
314-680-8599 or use this link for a free consultation and find out how
we can help you.