Bored Kids Turn To Old-School Entertainment… Classic Mattel Toys Make A Comeback

[PeteS in CA]

Bored Kids Turn To Old-School Entertainment… Classic Mattel Toys Make A Comeback

https://hotair.com/archives/karen-townsend/2020/08/02/bored-kids-turn-old-school-entertainment-classic-mattel-toys-makes-comeback/

Mattel is seeing sales beat expectations and that is good news during the days of the coronavirus pandemic. The credit can be given to bored kids stuck at home and desperate parents trying to keep them entertained.

North American consumers are splurging on old-school entertainment favorites like Barbie dolls and the card game Uno, which makes Mattel a winner in an otherwise depressed economy. Sales are expected to continue to be strong in the coming months as schools remain closed. Mattel has seen its shares rise by about 4%.

The reopening of toy stores helps, too. Chief Executive Officer Ynon Kreiz reports that only about 4% of retail stores were closed at the end of June, while 30% of retail stores were shut at the end of March. Thus, reopenings were a factor in the rise in quarterly earnings. Gross sales rose in North America by 3% in the second quarter. Besides pointing to Barbie and Uno, Baby Yoda plush toys are credited for the increase in sales numbers. Gross sales of Barbie dolls increased 7% to $199.3 million in the second quarter. Overall net sales fell nearly 15% to $732.1 million in the economic fallout from the global coronavirus pandemic and overseas sales. But that number still beat analysts’ average estimate of $678.5 million.

Toys that let children's imaginations create the stories are better for children than toys and games that feed children canned stories.

[Cyber Liberty]

It's true.  I just bought one of these for Joe Biteme....

[Elderberry]

These kids won't be bored if they're let outside to explore. I was constantly outside as a kid. I was out before dawn, I'd come home to eat and then back outside until way dark.

[libertybele]

These kids won't be bored if they're let outside to explore. I was constantly outside as a kid. I was out before dawn, I'd come home to eat and then back outside until way dark.

Same when I was a kid.  We would go down by the crick which had also had a large open grassy area where we'd play baseball, rubber guns, bomb water spiders and hunt for pieces of slate in the crick, play tag or just go up to the very top of the hill above the crick and see who could roll down the fastest.  We'd also ride bikes, jump rope, play hopscotch, go for wagon rides, etc., and then we'd venture home at supper time and after supper my favorite thing to do was to catch fireflies and put them in a jar.  Alone time was always spent sitting on a blanket under the huge oak tree reading a book.  We didn't watch TV much and obviously back then no cell phones, computers or video games.  Life was pure and simple back then. 

[LegalAmerican]

How can children be bored?  PUT THEM TO WORK.  Paint their rooms. Help in the kitchen, preparing dinner.  Show them how to clean, mop, dust.  Cut grass, sweep the walk.  They need SOME CHORES.  Teach them to wash clothes.  Oh, my gosh. Whatever the parent does...THEY NEED TO HELP.  I was never bored as a kid nor adult!  We would play outside. Like Libetybelle said. We did have chores to do though.  Both my parents worked outside the home.  Toys were NOT BOUGHT for us.
In the summer time, when it got so hot, we played in the basement.  There was an old table, that I drew on with white chalk.  I made a house.  Then used catalogs, to cut out 'dolls' and make clothes for them. KIDS DO NOT KNOW HOW TO CREATE.  Age 11, I was already sewing some of my dresses.  I was taught to crochet at age 4!  I am not impressed with 'today's" kids. 

[Smokin Joe]

These kids won't be bored if they're let outside to explore. I was constantly outside as a kid. I was out before dawn, I'd come home to eat and then back outside until way dark.

yep. but before we got our first BB guns, these always came with us:

Mattel had a lot of fun toys, including booby traps....

[PeteS in CA]

It's true.  I just bought one of these for Joe Biteme....

You didn't get Biden a laptop?





I guess it is pretty advanced ...

[libertybele]

How can children be bored?  PUT THEM TO WORK.  Paint their rooms. Help in the kitchen, preparing dinner.  Show them how to clean, mop, dust.  Cut grass, sweep the walk.  They need SOME CHORES.  Teach them to wash clothes.  Oh, my gosh. Whatever the parent does...THEY NEED TO HELP.  I was never bored as a kid nor adult!  We would play outside. Like Libetybelle said. We did have chores to do though.  Both my parents worked outside the home.  Toys were NOT BOUGHT for us.
In the summer time, when it got so hot, we played in the basement.  There was an old table, that I drew on with white chalk.  I made a house.  Then used catalogs, to cut out 'dolls' and make clothes for them. KIDS DO NOT KNOW HOW TO CREATE.  Age 11, I was already sewing some of my dresses.  I was taught to crochet at age 4!  I am not impressed with 'today's" kids.

My grandkids all have limits imposed by their parents as to how much computer/video/tv time they have.  They also have chores that they are expected to complete before the computer/tv time.  The rest of the time they either play with toys or outside play time - it gets really hot here in the summer -- so pool time at the neighbors or water gun wars a lot of times.

[libertybele]

You didn't get Biden a laptop?





I guess it is pretty advanced ...

I think the rudimentary computer is more likely Slow Joe's style, the "See 'n Say" might be too difficult as it involves slight memory skills.

[Applewood]

These kids won't be bored if they're let outside to explore. I was constantly outside as a kid. I was out before dawn, I'd come home to eat and then back outside until way dark.

Reminds me of my brother.  Gone all day.  Most of the time he'd come home covered in dirt from head to toe.  My mother would have a hissy fit, but Dad would say, "Mary, he's a boy.  Boys are supposed to get dirty."    LOL

It was good for him -- fresh air, exercise, creativity.  He loved to build treehouses in the trees along the wooded hillside behind our house.  Taught himself how to work with his hands.  A lot of young people nowadays can't do that.

[GtHawk]

Yes well do I remember the classic Mattel toys of my childhood, somehow though I don't think they are the toys the author is thinking of.

https://www.bing.com/images/search?q=classic+mattel+toy+gun+images&qpvt=classic+mattel+toy+gun+images&form=IQFRML&first=1&scenario=ImageBasicHover


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Of course when I was a kid we played a different way because boy's were allowed to be boys not 

[LegalAmerican]

My grandkids all have limits imposed by their parents as to how much computer/video/tv time they have.  They also have chores that they are expected to complete before the computer/tv time.  The rest of the time they either play with toys or outside play time - it gets really hot here in the summer -- so pool time at the neighbors or water gun wars a lot of times.

Excellent! Good parenting. All this builds self esteem, when they master their chores.  Gives them a sense of accomplishments. They are master of their own domaine.  Playing with toys, does not do that. Creating..does. As mom & grandma..I have learned a few things. Who does not feel good about themselves, when a dish from the kitchen turns out well?  My 3 year old grandchild loved cleaning my aquarium with me.  He got to take out some of the items to clean off algae.( little fingers in water) He got to fish out some fish with net, to put in other bowl. Then when clean, I allowed him to put back items in the tank.  He loved it.  Breathed deeply, like they do when concentrating.  He loved making cookies.  I showed him how to use the cookie cutter. Then, he decorated them, the way he wanted. He hardly ate any of them.  It was the fun in making & decorating them.  He took them home and his dad enjoyed them.

[Smokin Joe]

Yes well do I remember the classic Mattel toys of my childhood, somehow though I don't think they are the toys the author is thinking of.

https://www.bing.com/images/search?q=classic+mattel+toy+gun+images&qpvt=classic+mattel+toy+gun+images&form=IQFRML&first=1&scenario=ImageBasicHover


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Of course when I was a kid we played a different way because boy's were allowed to be boys not 

Yep, we played "army", regularly when we could get enough kids to have two sides, and sometimes even when we didn't. most of the area was farmland, owned by relatives, and the sight of us roaming the farm or woods or rivershore with toy tommy guns, (eventually BB guns or .22s was nothing unusual.  People didn't wet their pants at the sight of a gun, then either.

[Elderberry]

This looks like the one I had as a youngster.